


09 Speed Trap

by Merrianna, SpeedBurn (samwise_baggins)



Series: Speed Burn [2]
Category: CSI: Miami, CSI: NY
Genre: Character Death, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2016-08-09
Packaged: 2018-08-07 05:19:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 23
Words: 51,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7702255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merrianna/pseuds/Merrianna, https://archiveofourown.org/users/samwise_baggins/pseuds/SpeedBurn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Miami, Dade loses one of its own, it effects more than just Horatio's team. The repercussions can be felt as far away as even New York City.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dying

**Author's Note:**

> Spoiler: Yeah, season 1 of CSI: New York and seasons 1 – 3 of CSI: Miami. Specific episodes: "Officer Blue", "Night Mother", and "Tanglewood" from CSI: New York; "Dispo Day", "Freaks and Tweaks", "Big Brother", "Lost Son", "Under the Influence", and "From the Grave" from CSI: Miami; "MIA to NYC: Non-Stop" crossover for CSI: New York and CSI: Miami. Specifically, the entire episode: "Lost Son" from CSI: Miami.
> 
> Disclaimer: CSI: Miami was created by Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn, and Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Alliance Atlantis Communications (2002-2007), The American Travelers, CBS Paramount Network Television (2006-2009), CBS Productions (2002-2006), CBS Television Studios (2009-2012), Jerry Bruckheimer Television, and Touchstone Television (pilot only). CSI: NY was created by Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn, and Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Alliance Atlantis Communications (2004-2007), Alliance Atlantis Motion Picture Production (2004-2007), Alliance Atlantis Productions (2004-2007), CBS Paramount Network Television (2006-2009), CBS Productions (2004-2006), CBS Television Studios (2009-present), Clayton Entertainment, and Jerry Bruckheimer Television. I am in no way connected with these people, and I do not claim ownership of these characters, lands, or names. I have borrowed them to share a story, and most likely not a story any of them would have written, had they had the time or no. I am making no money from this and it is just for my entertainment and that of free entertainment to a select group. Thank you.
> 
> Setting: AU: SpeedBurn: Saturday, December 4, 2004 to Friday, September 23, 2005: Maine, New York City, and Miami.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Saturday, December 4, 2004: Old Harbour, Maine:
> 
> .

Groaning, the thirty-something man shifted restlessly on the hard wooden floorboards of the nearly bare apartment. Only a sleeping bag lay between him and the cold surface, doubled over for cushioning instead of on top of the man for warmth. He shivered as a draft crossed his thinly clad body, T-shirt and old jeans not enough protection in the cold December air of a late New England fall.

He shifted again and felt an intense, sharp tug of pain in his chest, and his hand went defensively to cover the ragged wound dubiously protected by old, none-too-clean bandaging. The sudden attack left him panting and weak. He didn't know how he could live like this much longer.

The program was supposed to help him, not bring him back from the edge of the abyss to desert him, freezing and weak and alone. He wondered just how many other screw-ups had left people without money or help at the possibly worst time in their lives. If something didn't change soon, if the program didn't figure out why he was there and how to get him out of it, they might as well just bury him, because the young brunet couldn't stand another night of this wretched existence that had become his life.

Distraction; he needed distraction.

With a soft sigh, feeling the sharpness easing in his wound, the man opened chocolate-colored eyes. He moved his shaking hand up, over his damp face and into shaggy, unkempt brown-black curls. Rather than dwelling on the lack of furniture, medical care, and even soap, in his current life, he concentrated on the little things.

"My name is Joe Avery," he told himself, the suddenly hoarse admission cutting through the cold night air. "Joe Avery . . . the nobody." A derisive, humorless snort followed that statement, cut short by a gasp at the renewed sharp pain. _Damn!_ If the program didn't come through soon, he wouldn't need medical care anymore; he'd be dead already.

Joe let his pain-filled eyes close once more, willing the intense pain to ease, to disappear completely. As it obeyed, this time, the man further willed himself to relax. The pungent scents of human sweat and unwashed body and clothes surrounded him, but he'd actually started to get used to the sickening odor. Life was a far cry from the way it used to be, before he'd made mistakes, before he'd wound up in the program and just this side shy of homeless and derelict. Hell, in a couple more days, he'd be out of the food he'd been grudgingly provided by the bitter woman who'd dumped him in this unfurnished, unheated studio apartment. Then he would have to go begging, something the once proud man had never done in his life. In fact, this was the first time in his life he'd actually not had enough to eat, had the threat of starvation hanging over his broken body.

"I live at 44 Donner Street in Old Harbour, Maine." _Live? Yeah, right! As if anyone could call this living._ It was more like a limbo existence, somewhere between hoping against hope to be rescued and waiting to die in obscurity. He might as well have taken his chances in the shelters and churches; they'd undoubtedly have helped him more than the program.

Hell . . . that was what the program should really have been called.

God, he needed a fix: just something to take the edge off, really. A bitter chuckle escaped the thin man, followed by a gasp of pain as his chest once more reminded him of its recent trauma. Once upon a time, when he'd lived a different life, a fix would have meant something nefarious and disgusting . . . would have meant coke or heroin or meth. Now, it simply meant _'something, anything to get rid of this soul-eating pain.'_ If he had money, he might have even been tempted to try one of those forbidden false self-medications . . . then again, if he had money, he'd have checked himself into a hospital, no identification be damned.

Ironic how hard the paramedics had tried to save him, had even used electricity to bring him back from the dead. They'd pushed so much blood into him; his DNA could have changed, if that had been possible. With all the tubes, wires, and monitors, for two months Joe had looked more like Frankenstein's creature than a real human being. And for two months, his precarious life, shattered by a single bullet, had balanced on the thin knife's edge of hope. Science nearly gave up on him, medicine wailed in despair that he would ever regain that ephemeral state called life, and religion hovered just out of reach, waiting to claim him in that final, all consuming darkness each person comes to dread or resignedly accept. Somehow, someway, life had won and the man known as Joe Avery had been reborn. Had been reborn merely to find himself neglected, forgotten, two and a half months later, lying on a cold hard floor in an out of the way place, dying once more . . . this time more slowly and painfully than the initial shooting had done.

Perhaps, just perhaps, he should give in, waste the efforts of that heroic medical team and let the cold darkness claim him. Perhaps the doctors had been wrong to defy God and pull him back into life. Perhaps Joe Avery was never meant to exist, the man he had been was meant to die in that shooting so very long ago, two and a half months and a lifetime in the past.

Joe closed his dark brown eyes once more, and this time, he didn't even bother to gasp as the pain shot through his heart and radiated over his chest. This time, he even stopped trying to will it away.

Perhaps it was time Joe Avery accepted death after all.


	2. Rescued

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New character: OC: Ivana Gideon, FBI Profiler, was created by Merrianna.
> 
> Setting: Saturday, December 4, 2004. Maine.
> 
> .

Ivana Gideon was not amused as she fitted the key to the lock. The door, however, swung open of its own accord, never having been fully shut it seemed. Blowing platinum-colored hair from in front of her baby blue eyes, mentally reminding herself that she would have to fix the knot of long blonde hair, the woman gently pushed the door open the rest of the way. She warily glanced around the perimeter of the large room revealed by the opening door and gasped at what she saw.

Hurrying into the ice-cold, bare room, she pulled out a cell phone and began dialing. There was no connection and she cursed the lack of cell towers in this out-of-the-way section of Maine. Help wouldn't be arriving tonight.

Sliding to a halt, dropping to her knees as she did so, the woman ignored the stench of dirt and sweat. She let her hand play over the clammy skin of the man lying on the sleeping bag before her. _Damn! The program's supposed to protect these people, not relocate them then neglect them._ "Come on, be alive, damn it!" Her husky voice played out in the chilled air of the unheated apartment, almost startling her as it echoed dully off bare walls.

Questing fingers located a weak, thready pulse in the man's throat, and relief swept over the agent. "Good boy!" The encouragement felt sorely out of place, but she needed to hear something, anything alive in the godforsaken place. She ran her hands down, over the man's too thin chest, stopping at the dirty, blood-caked bandages wrapped around his torso.

"What the hell?" This man needed medical help! She wasn't prepared for this, hadn't the means to help him, transport him, even to pay for the basic life support he would most likely need. The program had failed again.

Not that the public heard of the failures, of course. What honest, hardworking citizen wanted to hear that their tax dollars paid for hardened criminals to be relocated to a nice little suburb where their lack of criminal record allowed them to once more hunt for innocent prey? What conscientious voter wanted to know that an innocent victim had been transferred out of a life of danger and deserted to die alone on a cold, hard floor, bleeding and broken? What American wanted to hear that his government had failed, once more, to protect the average man and succeeded in letting criminals walk?

The Witness Protection program wasn't supposed to fail like this . . . and yet it had . . . again.

Ivana made a quick decision, trying to save a life that should never have been endangered. She slid her hands underneath the man's shoulders, gripped his arms at the pits, and tugged. It didn't help so she let him go and grabbed tight fistfuls of the sleeping bag he lay on. Again tugging, she panted for breath by the time she'd made any headway. It wasn't enough.

With a soft grunt of disapproval, she let the anger wash over her, anger at her helplessness, anger at the program, even anger at her superiors for assigning her this 'easy babysitting job' when she should have been helping catch serial killers and rapists; she had a job as a federal profiler not a common social worker. This should have been her brother, Sergei's, assignment; he was the U.S. Marshal.

The anger didn't help much, but it lent a small strength to her aching arms and fingers. She tugged again and again, inching her burden across the dirty floor, heading for the door and civilization. Not once did it cross her mind to leave the man and run for the help she'd been unable to call for. Her training hadn't included these rescue efforts, hadn't really included anything regarding the program actually, much later common first aid sense would remind her of the simplest procedures she could have taken.

Someone below must have heard the dragging and grunting and groaning noises coming from the studio apartment, because suddenly two men came charging into the apartment, shooting questions at her concerning her possible need for help. She merely gasped out, "He's not well," as she tugged her burden towards the door once more. One man stopped her as the other, a large hulking dock worker, knelt down to examine the dark-haired victim.

He examined the man's bandages while his partner asked hurriedly, "Who is he? Your husband?"

Flipping her damp, loosened waist length hair from her red, sweaty face, Ivana shook her head. She mentally cursed her overweight body, knowing it had slowed her down in a critical time. "No, he's…" her mind raced through the possibilities and she settled on the most harmless explanation she could find. "He's a friend from work. His name's Joe . . . uh . . . Joe Avery," Ivana's memory for details came to her rescue, at least. "He was hurt awhile back and when he didn't check in, I thought I'd look in on him."

These good Samaritans accepted her hasty story at face value. God bless generous New Englanders. The larger man gathered the sickeningly slight form of Joe into his burly arms, surprise for the unexpectedly heavy weight of the deceptively frail-looking burden registering on his swarthy features. He grunted as he lifted with his back not his legs, the bad posture making Ivana wince inwardly. With some effort the man hefted his burden out the door and down the flight of rickety, weather-beaten wooden stairs, arriving easily at the ground level with barely a pant to show for his exertion. He turned expectant eyes on the blonde agent, looking for further instructions. The other man quickly followed in his wake.

Ivana nodded and hurried down the stairs, heading directly for her SUV. Opening the door, she became conscious that the two strangers exchanged a knowing glance at the whims of an outsider; most rural New Englanders found it completely unnecessary to lock their doors in towns where everyone knew everyone and the largest crimes around were tossed eggs and toilet paper on the night before Halloween. She didn't care if her actions had marked her _'outsider;'_ she knew her expensive tailored business suit and leather briefcase already had identified her as a foreigner to this tight-knit community.

"Put him on the back seat." Her voice held the crisp edge of authority, and she found herself instantly obeyed. With a quick nod, she headed for the driver's side door. "Thanks, guys. I appreciate it." She slid inside and started the car, ignoring further inquiries and offers by the helpful natives. Ivana had to get this guy medical help, and that wouldn't be found in rural Old Harbour.

The federal agent put her rental SUV into gear and headed towards the nearest city large enough to boast reasonable medical facilities. She would worry about program funding, and approval, later. She had a federal witness to save.


	3. Unpleasant Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Thursday, December 16, 2004. Miami.
> 
> .

With a nearly inaudible curse, Horatio re-read the letter. It had been sent by regular post and delayed in the Thanksgiving and Christmas rush that swamped the post office every year. Thus it had taken over two months to reach his hands; the forty-nine year old redhead wished it hadn't come at all. He couldn't deal with this now; he had too much on his plate already. He had to make sure this new guy would work out: Ryan Wolfe had worked well on one case, but he might not mesh with the group long term. Horatio had to see if he could hire on more investigative staff. Really a team of five for a county this big was hardly enough to effectively cover the busy day shift. And he had IAB breathing down his neck about the loss of Timothy Speedle, which still hurt deeply after nearly three months; he'd foolishly thought Calleigh's vague report had satisfied Stetler, but apparently he'd been too optimistic. Peg would have to wait; the crime lab supervisor simply didn't have time for her petty whining.

True his ex-wife didn't often come to him with problems, so he was most likely being too harsh on her. For nearly ten years, since their rather heated divorce, they had gone their separate ways. He could count on one hand the amount of times she'd actually asked for his help. Horatio, however, didn't want to deal with a woman who'd accused him of cheating on her to get a divorce, simply because, as it turned out, she hated being married to a cop. Though in a belated sense of fairness she'd refused the alimony the judge had tried to award her, her lies and ultimate confession still rankled . . . even after almost ten years. The woman he'd loved and thought to spend the rest of his life with now meant little more to him than any other person passing on the street.

However, unlike the person on the street, who only needed him if a crime was committed, Peg had decided to waltz back into his life like she still owned that privilege. Demanding, not asking but demanding, a meeting with him as soon as he could, which to Peg meant right away, was totally uncalled for. She didn't even have the courtesy to explain why she wanted him to drop everything and cater to her. Her note simply said, "We need to talk. It's urgent. Call me as soon as you can, Margaret."

Ignoring Peg's odd starts had never helped him avoid them in the long run. It had already been two months since she'd mailed the letter. Two months were enough time to try to put off such a distasteful meeting even if he'd not known of her request. If he didn't call her and arrange to hear her out chances were the price for ignorance would be much higher than he cared to pay. Peg was nothing if not demanding and self-centered. Bemused, Horatio wondered just why he'd never noticed those traits while he'd been married to the woman.

Horatio sighed and looked over the letter once more. With a shake of his head, the redhead pulled out his cell phone and dialed the number he'd long ago wished he could forget; she was still living in the house they had once shared, still had the same phone number after all these years. Walking to the bullet-proof plexi-shield wall of his office, looking down over the busy techs and hand-picked CSI's, Horatio listened to the shrill sound of ringing in his ear. It was an idyllic view all too quickly shattered by the tired, harried voice he had once enjoyed listening to.

"Margaret Wilson-Caine, may I help you?"

She still used her married name? How had he forgotten such a detail? With a small shake of his head Horatio pulled himself from the idle musings and softly spoke into the receiver of his cell phone. "Peg? It's Horatio. I got..."

He was quickly, forcefully cut off by her exasperated, "Well, it's about time! I sent that thing months ago. You picked a hell of a lousy time to give me the silent treatment, 'Ratio."

Wincing at the annoying nickname he'd once found so endearing, Horatio in turn cut her off. "Peg, I only just received it." His voice was as calm, as soft as it ever was, but it held that same hint of steel he'd often used in the interrogation room.

She was unheeding. "Right. It took two months to get a thirty-four cent envelope. Fine. I'll run with that." He could imagine her running her hand through those thick black curls, a habit of frustration that used to make him want to longingly follow with his own hands. "'Ratio," her voice cut that memory off, too, "I'm going overseas very soon . . . before Christmas, in fact. It's imperative that I see you right now. It's something that can't wait."

Ah, yes, Peg had become an investigative journalist, if he recalled correctly: a reporter, plain and simple; the bane of any cop's existence. He caught himself sighing and merely said, "I can meet you in one hour, for lunch, at the Bistro." He waited while she apparently flipped through an over-booked day planner to see if she could squeak him in for this all important meeting she wanted. Her answer actually took him off guard.

"The one we used to go out to when we were still together?" Was that a softness to her tone?  
Horatio didn't think so. He must have been hearing things. Rather than give into the pull of old memories, he spoke a little sharply. "Yes, that's the one. We'll meet for lunch, okay?"

Peg's voice quickly became just as no-nonsense. "Okay. Lunch in one hour. Bring your hearing aid, 'Ratio."

With a frown, Horatio stared at the now buzzing phone, trying to puzzle out that last comment. Damn, he used to think her cryptic remarks were funny and intriguing. Now, he just found it obnoxious: a puzzle he didn't need in a too busy time. Hearing aid? He'd never needed a hearing aid in his life. Maybe she just meant that she wanted to do all the talking. Well, that was normal; he hardly got a word in edgewise when Peg was on a tangent. He didn't look forward to lunch, already feeling the first signs of indigestion . . . and he hadn't even eaten yet.

xxx

Alexx worked quietly in the morgue, scrubbing down the main table after the most recent patient had come through. She preferred to think of them as patients rather than dead bodies. These people had been somebody, had people who cared for them. The moment she stopped thinking of them as people, she was afraid she'd stop treating them as people. And the dead had just as much right to dignity as the living.

Slowly the medical examiner's hand stopped raking across the cool surface of the metal slab. Her mind wandered back to a man who had somehow wound up on her table too early. Naturally, as she dealt for the main part with criminal cases and victims, most of her patients had died too early. But this man had been different, special . . . because he had been Tim Speedle, her friend. Tears welled up as she let herself remember the scruffy, handsome young man she'd so easily befriended.

He had been brilliant, genius really. An insatiable curiosity, mixed with a quick brain, had made him proficient in everything he touched. There didn't seem to be anything Speed couldn't do. But, like all geniuses, he had a slow spot, something which seemed to trip him up while others would have breezed right over. Where some geniuses could run circles around normal people in mathematics or quantum theory, Speed could run laps around his colleagues in forensics and pathology. Like those geniuses, who often had trouble even tying their shoes or adding simple calculations like one plus one, Speed had his own weakness: he had trouble remembering the easy things.

Speed couldn't remember to eat or sleep if he was concentrating on a case. He forgot to restock his kit on a regular basis. Sometimes he even forgot his own kit and had to borrow from Calleigh or Delko. And he forgot to clean his gun. It was that last fault which had landed the man on Alexx's table, under her skilled knife, having a bullet removed from his chest, right near the heart.

With a shudder, still trying to repress the tears and sobs which had wracked her for the last two and a half months, Alexx shook her head and began vigorously scrubbing once more. She couldn't forget, though . . . and those memories were pushing to the surface, too long repressed for her to do anything but finally give in and ride them out.

xxx

_Alexx had heard the call of "officer involved shooting" over the morgue scanner. Fearing she'd be needed, hoping she was wrong, the woman had collected her kit and run for the door. Perhaps, if she got there soon enough, she would be taking one of her friends or coworkers to recovery, not seeing him across her slab. Five minutes had been too long, though. When she arrived, on the run from the truck to the jewelry store, she knew she was too late. Taking off her glasses, hoping it was the sudden darkness in the interior of the store that caused her unholy vision, Alexx had to bite back a scream, instead settling on a look of total defeat._

_Horatio Caine knelt next to the body of Timothy Speedle._

_Blood smeared down the right side of the supervisor's face and his normally sunny blue eyes held a lost look, like a puppy that'd been kicked by its favored master. Speed appeared to have bled out, there was so much blood around him, pooled and already congealing in the late September heat, that no one could have survived such a trauma. Alex walked over to the pair and slipped to her knees, uncaring that her black slacks were becoming stained with blood: it was Timmy's blood, after all . . . her Timmy, the man she'd claimed as her closest friend outside of her marriage . . . Tim Speedle, her protégée._

_"Give him to me, Horatio. He needs to go with me." Alexx's soft voice had cut through the man's shock and he turned dazed eyes to her. Finally, after an eternity, he nodded and stood, proceeding to Calleigh with instructions involving ballistics. Alexx had been too busy with Speed to care what they spoke about and so would never recall the exact conversation later, only that it had something to do with Speed's gun jamming._

_She moved her hands carefully over Speed's blood-soaked blue shirt not noticing just when other people arrived. Alexx, however, hadn't even gotten a chance to verify for herself that his pulse was gone before a gruff man knelt beside her and pushed her hands away. Shock and indignation welled up in the gentle African-American and she sent a dagger-laced glare at the offending man. Her boss, the Chief Medical Examiner, squatted beside her and she softened her glare to one of pain. "I'll take him . . ."_

_His head shake stopped her in her tracks. "No. I'll take him. Meet me at the morgue and you . . ." he cleared his throat gruffly, "you can do the autopsy. But I'll escort his body, Woods. He's a cop and I should see to the cops. It's only right."_

_Grief turned to shock and she shook her head in protest. "I should be with him . . . he's my friend," Alexx looked down at the still form of Speed, "my baby . . ." she had spoken the last two words so softly she later doubted her supervisor had even heard them. It probably wouldn't have mattered; he immediately sent her a sympathetic look and explained that it would be better to give the reporters the appearances for now, that she'd be allowed to do the autopsy . . . in private . . . away from public eyes._

_An underling allowed to do a friend's autopsy in secret . . . was this what her life had turned to?_

_Alexx stopped protesting before he forbade her to process Speed at all. As the chief medical examiner he could pick and choose which bodies he took care of and which he passed off to his underlings. The woman merely walked back to her truck and drove herself back to the morgue, still unaware or uncaring about the blood soaking her pants and the trace blood coming off her hands to cover her steering wheel. She had to be there for Speed, to help him on that last, painful step to eternal rest. She had to be there in time to process Timmy. She owed him that dignity at the least._

_The oddities didn't stop with her boss' interference._

_Once the body arrived, a full two hours after she'd left the scene, she'd been too relieved to pay too much mind. Long waits were sometimes quite normal in a murder . . . the crime scene, including the body, had to be photographed and processed before anyone could move anything. Only a live victim got immediate attention._

_Fighting the tears in her eyes, Alexx gently cradled Speed's much larger hand in both of hers. After a long moment, she put it down at his side and stroked his still soft, blood-soaked curls. He looked so peaceful, she almost expected him to respond as if waking, though she knew he couldn't ever respond again. Carefully Alexx unbuttoned his shirt, pulling it wide to expose the bullet wound to his left pectoral. An inch or two lower and it would have gone into the heart. She raised the back of her hand to her lips to stifle a sob then continued to the foot of the table, removing his shoes one by one._

_Sometime during the autopsy, Horatio walked in to watch but Alexx couldn't have said when or when he'd left, either. She bit back another sob as she finally pierced Speed's cold flesh with her scalpel, examining everything, giving him her best work in his last moments. There was an appendectomy scar on his side; odd how he'd never mentioned the surgery to her. As she turned him over, deciding that taking the bullet out through his back would be easier, she was surprised to find the tattoo on his right shoulder. Speed had never mentioned a tattoo . . . ever._

_She ran a gentle hand over the fine artwork, the intricate details. With a curiosity borne of the need to know everything about her friend now that he could no longer tell her, she pulled over the magnifier and looked more closely at the tattoo. There was a small set of numbers on one side; it looked like a date: a 1989 date. A quick calculation had her realizing that if it was a date, Speed would have been sixteen. Was that the date he'd gotten the tattoo or had it meant something deeper to him? Alexx sobbed when she realized she'd never know; he couldn't tell her anymore._

_Finally, after long hours of grief-filled work, the autopsy ended. Alexx had discovered one other odd fact she had never known about Tim Speedle: he was left-handed. Actually, she had always believed him to be right-handed but the musculature and bone mass of both arms, as well as the calluses on his fingers, told her that he used his left hand far more than his right, contradicting the times she'd seen him working right-handed or even firing his gun right-handed. But after such intense grief, and such long hours, Alexx put it down to memory faults. She only thought Speed had been right-handed; the body said otherwise._

xxx

Looking back on that autopsy now, Alexx puzzled over why those small facts had stayed with her. Perhaps because they were little mysteries she could no longer get an answer to. The medical examiner sighed once more, shook her head, and began to put away her cleaning supplies. She couldn't let the memories of Speed overwhelm her or she'd never make it through the day. But, as always happened when she remembered her dear friend, Alexx wished she could just go home and cuddle with her husband and kids. It promised to be another long day in the sad line-up of long days she'd had since September 20th.

Lunch break might prove helpful.

Alexx had the urge for company . . . the company of her friends. She picked up her cell and dialed Horatio's number. His calming influence always put her at ease these days as if the strong, quiet leader of the CSI lab didn't have any room for worries, though privately Alexx knew of far too many worries the man shouldered. Somehow he always managed to make those around him feel relaxed and confident, and she needed that right then.

The phone rang only twice before it picked up and Horatio's quiet voice said, "Lieutenant Caine, Crime Lab."

A smile tugged at her lips, as she had known it would. "Horatio, are you busy for lunch?" Okay, a little too to-the-point, but it wasn't a date she was asking for, just some good, solid companionship to take her mind off Speed.

A long pause came from the other side, and Alexx was more certain with each passing second of silence that Horatio did, indeed, have plans. _'He's trying to find a way to tell me.'_ Had he heard something in her tone that made it hard for him to just turn her down flat?

xxx

 _'She sounds too cheerful . . . the way she does when she's been crying.'_ Horatio held back a sigh. He had that stupid lunch meeting with Peg but Alexx needed him. He hated having to run out on his friends. Alexx didn't often cry; nowadays it usually had to do with Speed. Horatio squashed the sudden hollow feeling that welled inside at the memory of his dead investigator. Alexx needed to be with the living right then and she'd chosen Horatio as the one that represented life most. Sometimes it was a heavy burden to be so morally supportive, but for a friend, he would move Heaven and Earth if he had to.

Making a decision, he finally said, "Not too busy for you, Alexx. I'm supposed to talk with Peg at one, but if you don't mind a brief moment of unpleasant conversation, I'm yours for the rest of the day."

He listened to the almost inaudible noises she made as she moved on the other side of the connection. Horatio assumed that Alexx was seriously considering backing out; any meeting with Horatio's ex-wife couldn't be pleasant. Finally she acquiesced. "You're on. I'll give you moral support, and you be my shoulder to cry on."

With a soft chuckle Horatio nodded, though she couldn't see it. "All right. Lunch at one then, Alexx. I'll meet you at the _Bistro_ down the street."

"The one with the pastrami Frank's always trying to get me to try?" Genuine laughter lit the woman's voice at that. "I'm having the tuna," she stated firmly. "Anything Frank wants me to eat is bound to be far too rich in all the wrong flavors."

Horatio laughed back, said, "Okay. One," then hung up. If Peg had a problem with his taking out a colleague, especially a happily married colleague, for a simple lunch then Margret could reschedule. He didn't want to meet with her after all. And Alexx had sounded like she needed company.


	4. Painful Meetings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Thursday, December 16, 2004. Miami.
> 
> .

She sat perched on the edge of her chair, impatiently checking her tiny, gold watch. Annoyance lit her grey eyes as she saw the time and she flicked her head, sending her trailing mahogany curls shimmering over her back to fall once more over her shoulders. Still beautiful, even at the age of forty, she would be beautiful for many years to come.

Horatio stopped, staring at the image his ex-wife made. She was sitting at the local restaurant Bistro, surrounded by natives in their Florida winter gear or tourists in their shorts and T-shirts; Peg, however, was dressed in an expensive suit by one designer or another. _'Nothing but the best for Margaret Wilson-Caine, after all.'_ With a sigh, offering a small smile to his companion, Alexx, Horatio made his way forward once more. _'Best to get this confrontation over with.'_

Peg looked up as the pair approached, feeling once again the stab of jealousy at seeing Horatio with a beautiful woman even if it was Alexx Woods. Peg knew the medical examiner was nothing but a friend for her former husband, and truly she didn't even have the right to jealousy; they'd been divorced for ten years. That didn't stop the same old feelings from resurfacing. An attractive man, it had been extremely hard to believe that her ex-husband hadn't used that to his advantage and played the field when they were still together. Of course, knowing Horatio, she had to admit that she'd really never felt he had been cheating... but it sure sounded like a more reasonable explanation to Peg than that he had to work late with the bomb squad all the time. Just how many bombs did one man see in a lifetime?

Holding a chair out for Alexx then slipping into one himself, Horatio tried his normal, easy-going smile on the woman who'd broken his heart. It worked and the annoyance drained from her expression to be replaced by an equally bright smile. He nodded then noted that there was a third place set at the small iron-wrought table. So Peg had brought a companion as well; that actually boded well. Perhaps this meeting was her way of showing that she had gotten on with her life, found a new man. Horatio was definitely supportive of the idea. A new man meant Peg would finally stop calling him, maybe even stop haunting his unguarded moments, filling him with bitterness he no longer wanted to feel.

"'Ratio, Alexx, I'm glad you could make it." She actually directed her words towards Horatio but her smile took in the medical examiner as well. Apparently showing up with another woman hadn't rankled his ex-wife. Good. It shouldn't.

"Peg, have you ordered?"

Observing the pleasantries made this meeting appear more sociable, less strained. If he was right and Peg had brought her new man to meet him, he wanted to be receptive and supportive. Besides, if they were eating, Peg would be less likely to wind herself up talking about their ancient history together.

Flicking her curls and having them fall again back into her face, Peg laughed lightly. Horatio's ears perked. That laugh sounded nervous. Something really bothered Peg; she was rarely nervous around anyone. That woman oozed confidence. "Yes, we've ordered. I took the liberty of ordering for you, as well. If I had known you had a lunch date, I'd have waited." Was she actually babbling?

Alexx, for her part, smiled easily and stayed out of the conversation. She flagged a waiter down, ordered a tuna melt, then sat back to enjoy the bright sunshine and show her support for her friend. Soon enough it would be her turn to bend his ear and her conversation would be just as upsetting.

Horatio tilted his head, glancing at Peg sideways, never full on. A habit he had formed who knows when, he'd never taken the time to break it. The words _'we've ordered'_ didn't slip by him and only confirmed that she had brought a companion along specifically to meet him. Otherwise she'd have come herself; Peg had never been afraid to meet him alone, even during the four months of divorce proceedings. "What did you want to talk about, Peg?" He kept his tone light.

She picked up her napkin, her hands trembling. _'Trembling? She really is nervous.'_ That surprised Horatio more than the letter had earlier. Gently Horatio placed a hand over his ex-wife's hands, looking into her eyes, trying to reassure her in whatever crisis she now faced. They had been friends and lovers once; he could find it in his heart to help Peg now.

Her eyes met his and she nodded, once, firmly getting a grip on her emotions. Sliding her hands from under Horatio's, she took a steadying breath and let it out slowly. "All right. The divorce," at Horatio's sudden frown she lifted a manicured hand and said, "please, hear me out. This isn't easy."

At his solemn nod she took another breath and started again. "I never claimed alimony from you, 'Ratio." Before he might even consider asking if that was what she wanted now, she shook her head with a small, bitter smile. "I never needed it despite everything and I still don't. I've made a name for myself in the journalistic community and am very well off." Her grey eyes met his blue ones again. "So I'm not after money . . . exactly."

"Exactly?" Horatio tilted his head, a frown crossing his face, clouding his eyes. His tone held more bitterness than he'd intended, but he let it go. If she was so well off, couldn't she see that a cop's salary could hardly make a dent in what she already made?

Lunch arrived and Horatio waited for the waiter to settle everything on the table and move off before asking, "What are you after if it's not money . . . _exactly_?" He put a chip into his mouth just to have something else to do.

"A home?"

Horatio choked on the food and felt Alexx pounding his back. Peg had the grace to blush as Horatio sipped water and tried to clear the coughing sensation. Finally, once again under control, he choked out in a hoarse voice, "A home? What about the house you got in the divorce?"

Peg started shaking her head, hair bouncing wildly. "It's not for me, 'Ratio. It's for him." And she pointed to a spot near the Bistro, behind Horatio's chair. He slowly turned and what he saw nearly took his breath away.

A boy came towards them, perhaps nine, with flaming red hair and too-large blue eyes. His expression appeared uncertain but the way he carried himself bespoke quiet confidence. Horatio felt like he looked at a miniature copy of his self . . . a self from forty years ago.

The red-haired man didn't take his eyes off the equally red-haired boy for a second; however, he aimed his question at the woman sitting across from him. "You were pregnant . . . and didn't tell me, Peg?"

"Oh there you go, 'Ratio." The bitterness in her voice finally drew his attention back to her. "And next you'll be saying how you should have been helping me with him all these years." She glared at him, her eyes steely in disgust. "Always the hero, right, 'Ratio? Well, I didn't tell you because I wanted him to myself."

Confusion lit the man's eyes quickly followed by hurt then anger. She continued, unrelenting.

"Yes, I'm a selfish bitch. I didn't want you in his life, chafing at my ideas of child rearing, and turning his head with your damn adventurous cop stories. I wanted to prove to everyone, including myself, that I could do it. I could have a child and a career without having a man to lean on." Peg's eyes blazed and there was no stopping her. "And I did it. I raised that boy for nine years and still made myself a star in the journalism industry." Pride and anger warred in the woman's voice.

Horatio clenched his fists and turned his head to once more study the approaching boy. Slowly, so softly it would have warned any of his friends of his very dangerous mood, Horatio asked, "And why are you telling me now? You haven't needed me in his life so far . . . what makes you need a low-life man . . . a cop, after nine years?"

"I'm going overseas, and I can't take him with me. He needs a stable home to grow up in and I have no idea how long I'll be gone. I'm being sent to Iraq to cover the fighting."

Slowly Horatio turned to his ex-wife, not seeing the embarrassed sympathy in Alexx's face or the wary curiosity in the approaching boy's. "So you don't even tell me I'm a father for over nine years then you expect me to rearrange my life . . . my dangerous, over-worked life . . . to raise a boy who doesn't even know me and probably has heard only negative things about me?"

"Oh, get off your damned high horse, 'Ratio. It's not about you; it never has been." She threw down her napkin and stood up, pulling forward a stuffed gym bag he hadn't noticed before then. "Will you take him or not?"

Sitting straight and proud in the wrought-iron chair, Horatio Caine glared at the woman he'd loved all those years ago, a woman he'd begun to hate, but now he didn't even dislike her. He had no emotions remaining for this selfish woman, only disdain for the way she used everyone around her. "I'll take him, Peg. But don't expect to ever take him back. I'll fight you in the courts if I have to."

The detective stood up and took the bag from her suddenly nerveless fingers. His look of contempt served to make her pale as he started to turn away. Turning back one last time, his voice soft and deadly as a cobra's strike, he said, "And it was never about me, _Margaret_. It was supposed to be about _us_." With that, Horatio strode quickly towards the boy he'd never known existed, followed silently by an embarrassed, and rather angry, Alexx.

Neither looked back at the woman who'd so blatantly thrown Horatio out of her life.


	5. Surprising Encounters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. New York City.
> 
> .

At the sound of the door, Flack's head raised and his piercing blue eyes fell on the soaked, huddled figure staggering inside. With a frown he straightened, pushing away from the dispatch desk. His senses were telling him that bad news had just walked in, and Detective Don Flack always trusted his senses. With a wary eye the young officer strode purposefully toward the pale, bent-over figure in the too-thin jacket.

Maybe that was it . . . maybe it was the fact that it was January and this guy had nothing warmer on than a denim jacket and newly pressed, yet worn-out blue jeans. The man had seemed to make a concession to the cold by putting on a flat cap, but it wouldn't help much in the sleet raining down outside. Old boots, so worn the original design was unidentifiable, clung to slowly shuffling feet, and a hand, almost blue with cold, clutched at the area around his heart.

_Shit! Is this guy having a heart attack right in the NYPD lobby?_

Flack jumped forward the last remaining steps and encircled the man with his arms. "Sir? Do you need help?" He prepared to call 9-1-1 at the first indication of distress but had to be sure it was injury, not cold, which caused that clasping gesture of that too pale hand.

"No," the man gasped out, leaning heavily into Flack and trembling from exertion. He lifted his head slightly, revealing deep, chocolate colored eyes in a face gaunt with recent illness. Black-brown curls were plastered to his forehead and nape, giving him an almost boyish look. At the doubt in the New York detective's eyes the man clarified, "I'm out . . . of breath . . . from walking . . ."

Without warning, he pushed away from the helpful detective and shuffled to a nearby wooden bench. Sinking onto its hard surface, he made an appreciative noise. "Forgot . . . what work . . . subways are . . ."

That did not ease the tension one iota for Flack. He frowned, his handsome features twisting in consternation. Walking over to the bench he looked down at the wretched man and grunted out, "Okay. Why the police department? Are you here to shelter from that storm or do you need something?" He couldn't help the distrust in his voice, bred into him from generations of New York City cops, each one living and working in an ever more dangerous city.

A soft chuckle, sounding rather bitter, escaped the man, causing Flack's brows to furrow in confusion. Looking up the man slowly said, "I've got an appointment on the thirty-fifth floor." He seemed to have regained the ability to breathe at least. "Please tell me there's an elevator?"

 _An appointment on the thirty-fifth? Why does he have an appointment at the Crime Lab? That doesn't make sense. It can't be for a job. Mac's fastidious about appearance, and this guy looks like a hobo._ He also looked like he couldn't work his way out of a paper bag . . . and a guy needed big brains to work for Mac Taylor. Flack crossed his arms, his face registering his disbelief.

The man had reached his right hand into an inner pocket, apparently quite aware of Flack's wary eyes following his every movement. He took out a pair of thin-wire-rimmed glasses and perched them on his nose, blinking owlishly up at the still distrustful detective. The glasses were so new as to be contradictory to the threadbare clothes he wore. "I've got an interview." The man once more reached inside his coat.

Quickly, Flack's hand shot towards him, grasping the too thin wrist in a secure but painless grip. "I wouldn't do that too often in here, buddy. You might get a bullet for your trouble."

Brown eyes widened then the man lowered his lids to half-mast and nodded slowly in understanding. "Okay. I was reaching for my papers from the agency. I've got references and an interview slip." He waited patiently, not pulling away from the strong detective.

"Yeah, well, nice and easy then. Show them to me." Flack let the man's wrist go and unconsciously wiped the hand down the side of his trousers. The guy was cold and clammy, and it was like touching a dead body . . . almost . . . if one discounted the movements and the strong pulse Flack had felt under his fingertips.

With the recommended slow gestures, the man pulled a folded sheaf of papers from his inside pocket brandishing them for Flack's benefit then smoothing them out on the bench next to him. At least he'd been smart enough not to lay them on his drenched pants leg. Finally the man looked up and spoke in a quiet, almost amused sounding voice, though exhaustion tinged the sound. "My name is Joe Avery, and I'm here to interview as a lab tech for a Detective Taylor?"

The man's name didn't ring any bells for Flack, not that it should. Unless someone deliberately hunted him down to spread the word, Don was out of the loop concerning the lab. He didn't work for Mac. Looking over the worn-out gentleman again, Flack had some serious doubts about this situation. If the guy came looking for an interview, even came with recommendations, he wasn't going to make a good first impression on the ex-Marine upstairs. His clothes alone screamed _'homeless.'_

After a long moment, the seconds ticking into minutes on the standard issue wall clock above the dispatch desk, Don nodded. "I'll call Mac. You wait right there, Mr. Avery." Don didn't move away from the man's side, not liking the idea of leaving this guy unattended in the police department. Instead, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed the too familiar number of the New York City Crime Lab.

xxx

In his office, overlooking the entire wide-open layout of the lab, Mac Taylor sat working at his desk, catching up on some paperwork he'd had to put off due to three recent unconnected homicides found all on the same day. Mac loved this city; he loved his job; he hated the paperwork. Still it had to be done, and with the unexpected, and extremely rare, quiet he tried to take advantage and finish early. Maybe he wouldn't be working late tonight.

Not that working late really mattered to the tired man. He rarely, if ever, slept anymore. The most sleep he could boast was an hour or two snatched here and there. He wasn't overworked . . . he was an insomniac, had been ever since the Trade Center went down. Mac didn't like to dwell on the reasoning for the insomnia. Everyone knew he'd lost his wife, Claire, in the terrorist attack; why dredge it up daily four and a half years later?

For that very same reason, Mac's desk and office were clear of any personal mementoes: why dredge up old memories? After Claire had been killed, Mac went into a severe depression. Anger and grief had nearly torn him apart and all he wanted to do was lash out and destroy anything that reminded him of the woman he'd loved and lost. He'd trashed most things and put the photos in storage. Then he'd tried to bury the memories, as he couldn't bury the body; she'd never been located. Fortunately his partner Stella had been there for him when he'd lost control and gotten severely drunk that first Christmas.

 _Damn!_ Work was supposed to be the catharsis he used to get rid of the aching memories. He couldn't take that dark road again, not now, not when he was starting to heal. Starting to heal . . . after four, long, painful years. He had to clear his mind, get a grip before he broke down in front of his people. Mac always tried to present a strong front, the tough ex-Marine with no heart. He did his job and did it well, emotion and heart be damned; they had no place in the life of a criminal investigator.

Standing, the dark-haired man strode quietly to one of the bullet-proof plexi-shield office walls, watching the scurrying in the lab without really seeing it. Trying to distract himself, he mentally reviewed the recent memo he'd gotten. It had been unexpected, and not entirely welcome, and he didn't like the idea of cooperating with the politely veiled orders. Orders, however, they were, and Mac followed orders, no matter how distasteful . . . despite needing investigators not lab techs.

The ring tone signaling a call broke through his silent reveries and Mac snatched up his phone. Quick fingers flicking the proper button, Mac simultaneously brought the phone to his ear, pausing briefly to hear the signal that the call had come through, then firmly said, "Detective Taylor."

As Mac had programmed ring tones for each of his frequent callers, Flack's voice breaking through the connection was no surprise. "Mac? There's a guy down here claims he's got an interview with you?"

 _Already?_ Mac withheld the sigh that wanted to escape. He merely responded, "I'll be right down, Flack." With that, and Flack's surprised affirmative, Mac shut off the phone. He slipped it back into his pocket, grabbed his suit jacket, and headed out of the office for the elevator. While waiting for the car to reach the ground floor he slipped into the black coat, the only expression on his face one of withdrawn disapproval.

He would have actually been surprised if someone had let him know that it was his standard expression nowadays.

xxx

Don waited impatiently for Mac to show up. He eyed Mr. Avery warily the entire time, noticing how the man seemed to be content to merely re-read his own paperwork. The color came back into the man's face but no amount of calm changed the fact that Mr. Avery dressed like a Salvation Army reject. _He absolutely won't get the job, on principal alone, recommendations or credentials be damned._

Mac approached from the rear elevator. The closed look on the investigator's face became even more shuttered at the sight of the man sitting in a puddle of melted sleet on the hard wooden bench. Flack had to admit; he'd been right about Mac's disapproval. With a shrug the younger detective looked to Mac as if to say _'What can you do?'_ The other man merely nodded once in acknowledgement and said, "Mr. Joseph Avery?"

Flack clench his jaw to prevent it from dropping. _This guy's expected? No way's he getting on that elevator. Mac won't let him in the lab, no way._ Don found it hard to believe that fastidious Mac Taylor hadn't just taken one look at the wreck of a man and sent him packing. The investigator's next action nearly sent the detective into permanent shock.

"Follow me, Mr. Avery. You need to get dry before you can tour the lab."

With that almost pleasant sounding command, Mac led the drenched, worn-out man towards the rear elevator, leaving a shell-shocked Don Flack to watch after the pair.

A few minutes later Don jogged after them, intent on finding out just what Mac was up to, though the shock had yet to wear off. He'd been sure Mac would refuse the guy, but this odd gesture of compassion? Yeah, it was sleeting like a bandit out there, but Mac wasn't usually the compassionate type. _Maybe he feels obligated 'cause the guy has an appointment?_ Flack vowed he'd understand before the day was out; he didn't like it when Mac pulled a surprise on him.

xxx

Mac nearly cringed at the sight of the wreck of humanity sitting by Flack's side. He held his reaction in check and quickly sized up the applicant.

Mr. Avery looked as if he should be in a hospital, not running through the driving freezing rain to get to a job interview, drenched, dressed in old clothes, and trembling with fatigue. Certain the man felt fatigue, Mac recalled the sight from back in his Marine days. Mr. Avery reminded Mac of a soldier at the end of a seventy-two hour patrol under threat of sniper attacks.

Normally Mac wouldn't have let such a disreputable looking figure past the dispatch desk; however, the memo he'd received concerning this interview kept him from following his normal procedure. He had to at least give the man a chance to prove himself. If Mr. Avery didn't work out, Mac would have no qualms about contacting the agency and sending Avery packing.

First things, first, though. The man couldn't go into the lab like that. Aside from the professional reputation of the lab, which this man certainly didn't seem to represent, he'd bring contaminants in with those soaked clothes. Once Avery stood Mac knew that offering his own spare suit wouldn't work. Joe Avery stood at least six foot tall, while Mac was 5'10"; the height difference alone caused problems. He'd have to offer the man one of the standard blue jumpers they kept on hand for garbage sorting.

With some detachment, Mac became aware that Flack didn't immediately follow, jogging to catch up a few minutes later. Not wanting an audience for this interview, the investigator stopped and turned, waiting for the detective. He absently noted that Mr. Avery came to a halt to his right, an observation pushed away just as quickly.

When Don caught up Mac gave him a neutral look. "Did you need something, Flack?" The look of surprise and the shuttering of his expression which followed let Mac know Flack knew that he was getting the brush off. To the younger man's credit, he merely shook his head and waited, watching as Mac and Joe Avery continued into the elevators.

The door slid shut, blocking out the sight of his colleague and friend.


	6. Too Many Questions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. New York City.
> 
> .

"What do you mean you've hired a new lab tech? Mac, we don't need a tech, we need _investigators_!" Stella Bonasera had her hands planted on her hips, glaring at her supervisor and partner, Mac Taylor. Normally she respected the man, even loved him . . . he was her best friend after all . . . but this was too much.

She'd fought him over the horse and later regretted it because it had shown his compassion coming back after four years of deep mourning for his loss. She stood by him when he'd declared the sleepwalker hadn't been a killer but an erstwhile rescuer because she trusted his instincts, though he rarely allowed intuition to guide a case. But to hire a man who looked more dead than alive, who apparently didn't have enough money to feed, let alone dress himself . . . that went beyond compassion or good intuition: that bordered on the insane.

When the stoic man didn't answer her, she switched to an exasperated, pleading tone. "Come on, Mac, talk to me." Stella dropped her hands from her hips to plant them firmly on the edge of Mac's desk, leaning towards him in her need to connect with him, to understand this out-of-the-blue decision. Calm blue eyes met fiery green ones and Stella had to reign herself in further, standing up, getting out of his space.

Finally Mac spoke, his voice as calm as his demeanor. "I had no choice, Stella." He stood, walking around his desk past the surprised woman and to the clear wall overlooking the trace lab and its lone occupant, Danny Messer. Without turning, Mac continued but his cool attitude subtly changed as he spoke.

"I received a direct order to hire him, sight-unseen."

Stella watched, incredulously, as Mac turned his back to the view and looked straight at her. "I don't like it but I have no choice. I want him kept under constant watch. The minute he doesn't work out, I'll tell the agency and make them put him somewhere else." Steel underlay in the ex-Marine's tone and that soothed the irate woman more than the explanation. Mac was looking out for the lab not getting sentimental.

The circumstances bothered her, however, and she couldn't resist probing further. "What agency, Mac?"

"The FBI."

It hung between them: that single phrase, those two words. It explained much but nothing at all. Quite obviously Mac wanted to chafe at the orders placed on him . . . would have chafed for any other organization. He respected the government, thus he would obey without protest unless the crime lab was threatened.

"FBI." Stella frowned thoughtfully and glanced towards the lab below seeking out the new man, Joe Avery.

He shuffled out of the locker room dressed in one of their jumpsuits. The man had black-brown curls that hung below his collar. He needed a shave and his skin had the pallor of the recently ill; his flesh gave the impression of hanging from his lean frame due to extreme weight loss in a very short period of time. His gold-rimmed glasses sat incongruously on his face: they looked too expensive, too new to be on the otherwise worn-out individual. He moved slowly, like a man far older than thirty-something, stopping every few steps to regain his breath.

Stella pulled her eyes back to Mac's face with a frown. They wouldn't have long to talk before Joe made it up to the office and she wanted as much information as she could possibly squeeze out of her long time friend.

"Why would the FBI order you to hire this guy? They can't just…" Her eyes widened and she quickly looked down at the slow moving Joe then back at Mac. "Is he Witness Protection, Mac?"

Mac's silence answered her, and she sighed. "Well, putting him in the middle of a police department would certainly protect him, but we need people qualified for the job. He'll stick out like a sore thumb."

The crime lab supervisor merely moved back around his desk and reached down, rotating the open file for his partner to see. Stella bent to look at it. Her eyes devoured the information there, an increasing frown marring the striking beauty of the Greek-born New Yorker. "His qualifications are . . . impeccable." Hesitancy laced her voice; the FBI regularly made up a background and qualifications for their relocated witnesses. It didn't mean he could handle the job, though: the program had been known to fail before.

"What I want to know," Mac's quiet voice cut through her thoughts and drew her eyes to his once more, "is why he's in the program. Some people are innocent victims, witnesses to horrible crimes. They need hiding and protecting." Mac frowned towards the man now slowly climbing the stairs to his office. Stella's eyes inadvertently flickered down to Joe then back to Mac. "But there are more people in the program that are criminals who struck a deal. They turn against their buddies and get a new identity so they can turn state's evidence."

Stella watched the disapproving look that came over Mac's face as he went on, "I don't like making deals with criminals. And I don't like the idea that I'm harboring a possible criminal in my lab."

She had to agree with Mac's sentiments; a criminal-turned-state's-evidence was not a good person to have in a criminalistics lab. Something tugged at her mind, though, and she found herself once more contradicting her colleague. "Look at him, Mac. He's hardly a bank robber or drug dealer. I'd say he was hurt recently and is in protection so he isn't hunted down again."

xxx

Watching the emotions play across Stella's face, Mac found himself having to agree. Something about the man said victim. But a stock broker turned against Enron or a man nearly killed by an angry wife didn't strike the detective as possibilities. Joe carried himself with an easy grace despite the painfully slow movements. Evidently the man had a certain pride in himself, a pride often carried by those who were confident in what they did and how they behaved. This man was no middle-class white collar worker caught in a situation beyond his control. He seemed more likely to be a . . . what?

Mac looked back at the man and wondered, feeling different scenarios and rejecting them just as quickly. He didn't seem to be a drug dealer turned against his cartel, there was nothing of the sneaky, manipulator about him. He couldn't be a bank robber or other kind of hard core thief; they only wound up in the program if they had serious gang or mafia connections. Mafia? No, this nearly broken man didn't feel like Mafia. So what?

The questions were too many, and far too important, to just blindly trust the Feds. Mac might hold loyalty and service high, but he also didn't like the idea that someone may have made a bureaucratic error that could endanger his lab and his city. He needed to check this guy out and it needed to be before too much damage could be wrought. He wondered if Sergei Gideon could help him.

Quietly he spoke once more to the woman beside him. "I'm going to check him out, Stella. I want him watched until I can clear him. If they put a witness with the police, they should be able to tell the supervisor that he's clear of any crime." After another long pause he said, "Let's show him around; see how he interacts with everyone." Mac didn't quite sound enthusiastic about the idea, but he had to do something with Avery until he could investigate him.

Before Joe could reach the door, Mac strode over and opened it, knowing that Stella would be close on his heels.


	7. The New Man

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. New York City.
> 
> .

Joe looked up as he slowly made his way across the lab and up the stairs to the supervisor's office. He could have moved much faster, but he feared another painful attack. They happened less frequently now, but the injured man didn't want to push his luck. As it was, he shouldn't have come to work so soon; Agent Gideon would throw a fit if she knew.

The agent had been sitting by his bedside when he'd awoken in the hospital and had to introduce herself two times before he'd finally understood. That first bitter woman had abandoned his case, replaced by the blonde-haired, blue-eyed Ivana. This woman didn't fit the stereotype of a federal agent, mainly because she had to be about twenty pounds or so overweight . . . feds usually trained rigorously and couldn't maintain a high weight. Her show of compassion also made her seem in the wrong profession. He had to admit that after two weeks of neglect it was nice to have contact with a caring human being. The entire confusing ordeal became a little easier to handle.

Unlike the first agent, who'd simply dumped him on the apartment stoop with a sleeping bag and an envelope containing about two weeks worth of food money, Ivana willingly tried to explain things. The first woman had told him, "You're name is Joe Avery. We'll work out the rest later. Someone will be assigned to you. Don't leave before that." The new agent had gone into a little depth, apparently still shocked by the harsh treatment he'd been subjected to.

xxx

_"Look, I'm not normally in the program, Joe . . . that's who you're supposed to be now: Joe Avery. I'm a profiler. I have no idea why Fredericks gave me this assignment but I'll do my best for you until I can get you assigned a real case worker."_

_Ivana had smiled reassuringly at him, and Joe, stuck in a hospital bed with another damned IV tube in his arm, merely nodded, not bothering to talk around the tubes trailing down from the oxygen nose prongs. Ivana only paused a moment before continuing and Joe had been content, for awhile, to listen and gather data._

_"Okay. From what I've read, you've got an amazing background in science. So I'll make a recommendation that you go work for a laboratory of some sort. I see you're from New York so we'll try to keep you away from there; we can't have you recognized." The woman flipped through her paperwork, ignoring the beeps and whirs of the machinery monitoring Joe's vital signs. She finally settled on a particular page and frowned, "Well, this won't be too easy . . . you have a few identifying marks. The chest and back scarring are the main ones . . . and the appendectomy scar . . ."_

_"What scar? I've never had any surgeries before now." His tone had been just a little curt but she seemed not to care, frowning at the discrepancies between what he said and what her file told her._

_"Maybe they did it while you were still out." That quieted the man and she continued, "What about other tattoos? There's only one listed here." She looked up from her papers into the brown eyes of the man she was interrogating._

_"No tattoos, either. I've got no identifying marks people would recognize, Agent."_

_She frowned. "So, this tattoo across your shoulder is nothing?"_

_Growing frustrated with her doubt, he had whipped back the blanket, uncaring that he lay totally nude underneath due to the Foley catheter in his penis. "Look," his hand played over the right side of his abdomen, "no scar. See?" And he groaned as he lifted his body enough to display a clean shoulder blade on first the left, then with some effort and an odd rocking motion, on the right. "No tattoos. Are you sure you've got the right person?" He did little to hide his anger. If he had been put through this hell for nothing . . ._

_Ivana merely frowned then looked him straight in the eye, apparently at a loss as to what to do with a victim who didn't quite match his identifiers. She reached over and tugged the blankets back over the injured patient without a word. Finally, after flipping through her papers once more, she seemed to make a sudden discovery and lifted a photograph from the file. With a flick, she turned it to face him displaying the face of the man; he could easily have been looking in a mirror, rather than at a picture. "So, someone gave me the wrong stats."_

_He couldn't deny the resemblance but something nagged at his medicated brain. Before he could form another question, the agent went on in a firm voice._

_"I'll interview you and see what kind of placement you should have based on a profile." The decision to use her regular professional skills seemed to sit well with her and she suddenly became confident and no-nonsense._

_Joe hadn't protested._

_It had taken several long hours of questions and answers: about his past, about his preferences, about his work, but finally the profiler seemed happy with her results. She stood up stretching out aching muscles then nodded to him. "I'll return tomorrow, Joe."_

_"Wait!" Joe's stern command had not been lost on the woman. She slowly turned to the patient, frowning, obviously not appreciating being ordered around. Joe tried to soften his tone while he pled for answers._

_"Why am I here? What do they think I know? Who's after me?"_

_Genuine surprise registered on the pretty features of the federal agent. "You don't remember the shooting?"_

_Waving a hand in dismissal, Joe shook his head. "Of course I remember being shot. But why would it land me in the program? It was a kidnapping case, not some smuggling…" and he fell silent. Had they stumbled onto something far more sinister than a missing boy and his murdered father? What the hell had happened after he'd been shot, anyway? "How about H?"_

_"H?" the reference had seemed to confuse her momentarily and Ivana pushed the ever escaping wisps of hair back from her face, towards the professional-looking bun she seemed to habitually wear. "I . . ." the agent shook her head in confusion before letting annoyance color her tones. "I'll ask, Joe. Your file doesn't say anything about a kidnapping."_

_Confusion washed over Joe at that fact but exhaustion followed closely after, and he suddenly couldn't concentrate. It was frustrating that the medical staff had decided to put him on that PCA pump: it automatically released doses of narcotic pain medications into his IV on a computerized schedule. It was great for controlling the searing pain in his heart but shit for helping him keep his thoughts organized or for having a normal conversation._

_Too tired to protest, too weak to fight the drugs, Joe had merely watched as Ivana walked from the room, file in hand._

xxx

With a sigh, Joe climbed the stairs, not rushing as he thought about the results of that and the subsequent two interviews. Ivana hadn't been able to find anything out yet and her funds were almost as limited as his own. She'd had to get him placed quickly. It seemed in the rush the program misunderstood her references and placed him in a crime lab in New York, not some neat little university research program out in _Boondock, America_. Ivana's hope for keeping him from being recognized, or endangered, wasn't coming off well at all.

The sound of the office door opening above him made the dark-haired man pause and glance up. He stood, waiting patiently as Detective Taylor and a woman he hadn't met yet came towards him. Silently he joined them as they walked down the stairs back to the lab level, listening as Mac introduced him to Detective Stella Bonasera.

Joe held out his hand to the lovely woman, feeling his glasses slip down his nose at his sudden movement. In annoyance, he pushed them back up, wondering why the hell he had to have glasses anyway; he had perfect vision. Anyone who looked through the lenses would see right away that the glasses were an affectation not a necessity. He felt like Clark Kent, posing as some stupid hick while the real man waited inside, thinly disguised behind a pair of wire-rimmed lenses that wouldn't even fool Jimmy Olsen. Stella smiled at him and he merely nodded back, once more pushing the annoying glasses into place.

In a friendly voice Stella greeted him, but Joe could see the wariness in her eyes. He remembered his childhood in Syracuse, and later his teen years in the City itself. Wariness was a normal attitude for New Yorkers so he didn't take offense, merely listened to the melodic voice. It sounded nice; nothing like . . . well, it was nice.

"Hello, Joe. Welcome to the crime lab. Where'd you transfer from?"

Clever how she tried to probe him for information without being too blatant; with so obvious, yet so normal, a question no one could accuse her of interrogation. He smiled gently and decided to give her his own version of his history since the Feds had failed to give him one. If they wanted him to play nice, they'd have to give him something more than a terse: _'Hurry up and wait.'_ "I'm not really transferring, per say, Detective."

"Call me Stella."

The man nodded, pushed his glasses up, and went on knowing that both detectives were listening attentively. "I had a bad run-in down south and decided to relocate. I tried Maine, but that didn't work for me so I came back to the city." That should take care of questions about the tan he still sported despite the grayish tinge from illness. Fortunately, the truth wouldn't be hard to remember either.

Mac interrupted with, "this is the DNA lab, Joe. Jane, this is Joe Avery, our new tech. Joe, Jane Parsons."

Smiling, offering his hand, Joe was soothed by the British tech's easy manner. Mac was a strict one, had already mentioned that he'd be expected to wear business professional clothes or a jumpsuit until he could acquire them. Stella was welcoming, yet wary. But Jane was all smiles and warmth. He could get to like that.

With a nod, Joe let himself be led from the room, noticing that most of the labs sported active techs scurrying about. The next lab over, however, remained empty of people, and so Mac skipped over it, simply stating "that's trace." Curiosity led Joe to stare after them, back towards the lab that interested him most, and a curious Stella called him back to the matter at hand.

"Are you familiar with crime labs, Joe?"

Joe looked at her and thought about how to answer that question. As a protected witness he wasn't supposed to give away his identity, but without an actual cover story he didn't have much else to go on. Once again he decided to rely on truth. "Yeah, I've worked in one before. I was a crime tech years ago . . . too many years ago, maybe." 

That elicited a laugh from a passing brunette in a jumpsuit like his. She had sleepy looking brown eyes, olive toned skin, and a walk that screamed "sex". He couldn't help letting his eyes linger, a genuine smile tugging at his lips. "Sounds like you liked it," she said.

Nodding Joe held out his hand. "Hey, I'm Joe . . . Joe Avery."

With a laugh that could curl toes the petite woman responded, "Aiden Burn. Nice to meet you, Joe-Joe Avery. Welcome to the lab. Are you a new investigator? We can use the help." Her smile made his heart ache in a totally different way than the bullet that had pierced it four months before, and the teasing tones elicited a different sort of smile from the man: a sleepy, almost contented looking smile . . . a smile that had girls cooing ever since he'd learned how appealing they found him.

xxx

"He's our new tech," Mac's voice cut across the flirtatious looks and banter. Aiden was perfectly free to do what she wanted, with whomever she wanted, on her own time. But right now, on lab time, she flirted with a guy that Mac couldn't trust. He determined that he'd have to clear Joe or get rid of him as soon as possible; he cared too much about his staff to let some possible criminal wreak havoc with them. His tone must have displayed his displeasure, because it drew a startled glance from Stella and a puzzled one from Aiden. With a forced smile Mac tried to ease the situation. "We've still got the entire lab and the morgue to cover, Aiden, if you'll excuse us?"

With that he began walking again, leading Joe and Stella towards the elevator, determined to see how the man reacted to the morgue. He knew a body lay out from a case Danny worked. The ex-Marine made a mental note to review the case with Danny after he finished showing Joe the lab. Meanwhile, Mac wouldd see just how his new tech handled watching an autopsy . . . if Mac was lucky Joe Avery would ask his case worker for an immediate transfer out of criminalistics.


	8. A Little Hint

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. New York City.
> 
> .

Danny slipped his glasses up to his forehead, rubbing his tired blue eyes with his free hand. He'd been at this half of the day and knew he'd probably still be at it half of the night. Looking for fibers, dirt, anything they could use to link someone to murder wasn't as easy as the cop shows made it seem. It took hours of meticulously scouring every minuscule particle: ruling out this, preserving that, on the off chance that the perpetrator had slipped up, gotten sloppy, left something worthy behind. It was long, painfully slow, and exhausting.

Maybe a change was needed. He should go pick up that liquid sample he'd taken from the victim's fridge; it was a pretty disgusting blood-like mixture he'd taken the precaution of refrigerating. Since the trace lab's fridge was full, he'd had to store it at DNA, but he'd need to work it sometime. It might make a nice change from checking for trace on the clothes.

With a sigh, the young blond returned his wire-rimmed glasses to their standard position and pushed back from the table he'd been working at. He needed a break. Hawkes hadn't paged to say he'd begun the autopsy and the DNA wasn't back yet on the sample taken from the sheets, so that gave him a small amount of time to get some coffee and stretch his back, then he'd get that liquid.

Danny once more folded the blazer he'd been examining and slid it into its bag. He carefully sealed and signed the evidence, marking in his case log so no one could later claim he'd mishandled evidence. Wouldn't the defense just love to get that one over on the lab when it finally went to trial?

He stretched again, rubbed at a kink in his neck, and headed out the door and down the hall, barely registering the fact that Mac and Stella were at the DNA lab with someone he'd yet to meet. He could always say "Hi" later; right now, coffee called him.

xxx

Mac nodded to Sheldon upon entering the morgue. He let a small smile play across his face at the sight of one of his closer friends. People might think it was odd, especially considering all of the losses Mac had suffered in his life, but the detective genuinely enjoyed the time he spent in the morgue with Dr. Sheldon Hawkes. It always felt like there was no pressure, he could relax and talk . . . or not . . . if he wanted. Mac felt he could confide in Sheldon.

As the supervisor opened his mouth to instruct Joe to approach one of the slabs . . . there were actually two bodies in the morgue, not just the one Danny's case involved but one of Aiden's as well . . . Mac felt a small tug of surprise. The dark-haired man in the jumpsuit didn't even need to be told. He walked forward, almost eagerly, and started watching intently as Sheldon worked.

The medical examiner looked up, smiled in a welcoming manner, and asked, "New? I'm Sheldon; welcome to the department." Looking down, he casually included, "Are you familiar with morgues?" 

Joe surprisingly slid on a pair of gloves, as if he'd been doing this his entire life. He stepped directly over to the slab, across from Sheldon, as Stella threw a glance at Mac. Mac in turn merely kept a stoic expression and watched his new tech. The new man seemed to be weighing his answer, as he had all his previous remarks.

"Joe. I've been in them before." 

Sheldon nodded as Mac filed away that information. These few tidbits seemed most likely to be the cover story for the new life Joe Avery had been provided, but it would help to see if the guy actually had the required knowledge of pathology listed in the file: a morgue had not been among the locations on his list.

"Any theories on how she died?" Sheldon's question still sounded casual and Joe merely gestured to the body as if for permission. The doctor nodded with a smile, watching as intently as Mac and Stella.

First Joe borrowed Sheldon's pen light and checked the victim's eyes. "No dilation. Sent a screen to Tox? Might not show anything but you never know." At Sheldon's affirmative, Joe checked nose and mouth. Lifting an eyebrow as if surprised, Joe made a small noncommittal noise in his own throat. "Hemorrhaging in the nasal and oral cavities." His voice sounded detached as he proceeded to lift back the flesh over the woman's throat and chest. Dark brown eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses showed an avid curiosity. He nodded. "Trace of fluid in the throat, lungs, and," he glanced at Sheldon, "stomach?" 

With a grin, Sheldon held up some carefully marked test tubes. "Right on all three. And?" 

Joe stared at the fluid samples for a long moment then went back to studying the woman's throat. "Possible semen. Should be sent to trace and DNA. Bruising of the oral cavity and throat . . . and the epiglottis." His eyes darted back up to the other man's. "She was suffocated . . . asphyxiation. Something was shoved down her throat, see the tearing?" He pointed to the tiny lacerations among the bruises in her throat. "He kept it there even after she passed out, maybe even after she was dead." Joe's face took on a fierce look of distaste. "Looks like the guy may have done it with his penis. Freak." 

Mac caught the last barely audible word. He looked to Sheldon for confirmation, and felt suitably impressed when the African-American man laughed and nodded enthusiastically.

"Dead on, Joe." He suddenly looked a bit sheepish and added, "Ah . . . no pun intended." 

Mac would remember the look in Joe's eyes as they met Sheldon's equally dark ones. It wasn't disapproving, but it was intense and serious. "Of course not; need those taken upstairs?" 

Mac jumped in before Sheldon could hand over the samples. "I'll take them, Sheldon. Thanks. Joe, Stella?" And with barely a nod for his friend, Mac signed for the tubes and turned, heading quickly for the elevator and the lab upstairs.

xxx

"Shit!" 

Sounding shocked and angry, Danny Messer's voice rang through the entire lab.

With a severe frown, Mac hurried his stride, ignoring the fact that Joe would have to drop behind. The supervisor didn't often hear Danny lose it in the lab; the volatile investigator was more likely to swear at a suspect than a sample. This time a perpetrator or a defenseless bit of evidence didn't have the New Yorker fouling the air: it was a lab tech from the AV department.

"Danny!" Mac's voice held an edge of steel and the blond turned his tirade on his supervisor.

"That was evidence, Mac! This," and the next phrase that came from Danny's mouth sounded like profanity, in Italian. He concluded with, "destroyed it! Look at it . . . all over the floor!" 

The tech appeared ready to sink through the floor if only he could. He sent the crime lab supervisor a nervous look then looked at the fluid all over the ground, amid shards of glass. "I didn't see him . . . I was . . ." 

"You were running in the," another rather offensive word, "lab," and Danny ended with a string of words even Mac, with all his time spent in New York and in the military, couldn't, or wouldn't, translate.

The firm voice of Mac cut off both swearing and defense. "Stop!" 

Through the immediate silence that followed . . . the entire lab seemed to come to a complete stand-still . . . Joe's quiet voice spoke up. "Give me those clothes and I can get that evidence out of it." 

Mac turned towards his newest person. As the evidence could hardly be destroyed further, he nodded. "Fine. Danny, Kyle, give your clothes to Joe. Joe, get as much as you can from what's here." The ex-Marine then looked around the lab and frowned severely. "Back to work; the evidence won't gather itself." 

xxx

Danny fumed but he could do little else. Covered in some unidentified liquid, which very likely had blood in it, and shards of glass, Danny couldn't believe that Mac ordered the case into the hands of a rookie. Danny would have remembered the tall, dark-haired man with the intense eyes if he'd been working in the lab for any length of time.

"The longer you take, the more it soaks in." The quiet voice surprised Danny and he looked directly at the man called Joe. Something about him seemed very familiar. Not recent-familiar, but long-time-ago-familiar. _Where did I meet this guy . . . the academy maybe?_

With a few more choice Italian swears, Danny started stripping his clothes off. If he moved from the center of the hall he risked contaminating the evidence even more. Danny had never felt more humiliated since joining Mac's team.

Stella held out a large evidence bag, and Danny sighed, reigning in his tongue. He glared at the bag, at his jacket, then back at the bag before shoving it inside. He quickly followed it by his shirt, belt, and trousers, leaving Danny standing in the lab hallway in nothing but his briefs. _This day can't get any worse, can it?_

"Well, that answers the big question." 

_It can._

Turning his head, careful not to move his feet as the new tech worked around him, Danny caught Aiden's amused smile full on. _Terrific! Does she have to be here? Couldn't she be in the morgue or something?_ Danny merely gave her an intense frown and shot back "Hey, when you got it, you got it." Her look of total amusement made him even grumpier as she strode past and down the hall. Danny felt too pissed to be appreciative of the view.

"Here, Danny, put this on." Stella held out a long lab coat, her face a polite mask but her green eyes dancing with laughter.

He reached for it with a barely grumbled, "Thanks." 

Before he could grab it, however, Joe stood and stopped him. "Your hands." 

Offering his already extended hand, Danny snidely said, "I thought we didn't need a new tech." 

The rude remark didn't seem to register on the guy as he swabbed Danny's hand. He merely nodded his head, used the back of his wrist to push up his glasses, and said, "Name's Joe, thanks for the welcome." He gestured for Danny's other hand, swabbed it, and let it go. "Done." Then the man took the bags of clothing Danny and Kyle had provided, along with his carefully collected samples, and headed for the trace lab.

Stella gave the younger man a gentle shove on the shoulder and he frowned at her. She held out the lab coat and pointed towards the locker rooms and the waiting jumpsuits.

The investigator nodded and sighed, then turned to catch a final glimpse of the new tech. Danny watched after him, less angry but now perplexed.

_Where did I meet that guy before?_


	9. Dangerous Situations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. Miami.
> 
> .

Rick Stetler, IAB investigator, strode purposefully through the spacious, well-lit lobby of the Miami-Dade Crime Lab. Some investigations went fairly quickly: he got a case, asked a bunch of questions, and came up with the solution, often involving disciplining the erring officer. This case, however, had been dragging on for four months, beginning to make him look bad back at headquarters.

More than the drawn-out length of the investigation had Stetler ready to spit nails; he also had to work in this particular building, with that particular man. Horatio Caine always seemed so condescendingly in control. It rankled the normally friendly intelligence man. _It's not right that a man can pull favors to get a higher ranking job than an honest, hard-working detective._ Stetler really hated how Lieutenant Caine kept coming out smelling like daisies, and Rick, himself, kept looking like the rear end of a horse.

With a curt nod for the extremely petite ballistics expert, Calleigh Duquesne, whom he encountered in the elevator, Rick glanced at the rising numbers and held himself erect. He felt false-cheerfulness oozing from the pretty blonde but he pretended it didn't exist. Most people hated him specifically because he was IAB; Caine's team probably had a whole host of other reasons to hate him, not the least that Caine accused Stetler of turning investigations into something personal against the Lieutenant's hand-picked team.

 _Well, this time I've got proof._ Finally, he could take down the jumped-up redhead in charge of the lab he, Rick, should have been running. Maybe the clever-talking man had gotten his team out of that drug running charge but there was no way he could do it again. Stetler held the evidence in his hands that Caine had been harboring a dirty cop . . . and had probably known it the entire time, too.

Upon stepping out of the elevator on the level of the steps to Caine's office . . . _temporary office_ , Stetler relished . . . he found himself still in stride with Duquesne. _Is she running to keep up?_ The woman couldn't be more than five foot three, while he was maybe a foot taller. Still, he had to admit her long strides and confident air made her seem just as at ease as if she were going for a slow stroll in a sunny park. _Does the woman have to be so annoying?_

The pair climbed the stairs together, to Stetler's annoyance, then made it to Horatio Caine's door simultaneously. With a glare Stetler turned to the small woman. "Was there something you needed, Detective?"

She sent him her mega-watt, over-bright smile and he seethed at the hypocrisy. He knew she despised him. _How dare she pretend I'm the most welcome individual on earth._

"With Horatio. Can you wait five minutes?"

Rick's mouth tightened in a grimace.

xxx

In a totally good mood, feeling nice even towards Rick Stetler, who'd been skulking around for the past four months dropping hints that he thought they were covering something up, Calleigh couldn't help the cheerful smile she shot at the frowning man. Her report should have made him go away but apparently it only caused the man to dig deeper into the backgrounds of the entire staff. Ryan Wolfe, their newest investigator, seemed to be getting paranoid. However, Calleigh was in too good a mood to even let Stetler bother her. She smiled brightly as he turned and asked if she needed something, to which she honestly replied, "With Horatio." Then, for good measure, she added, "Can you wait five minutes?"

It had been a perfectly reasonable request; she currently worked a double homicide. The scowl on the man's face made it seem as if she'd told him to go take a long walk off a short pier. _Okay, my mood's starting to slip._

He didn't get to answer her, and she didn't get to press him, because Horatio's door swung open.

The tall redhead looked tired; who wouldn't be after acquiring a healthy, inquisitive nine-year-old? His blue eyes were merry, though, and he nodded pleasantly to the both of them. "News, Calleigh?"

Wanting to crow at the fact that she'd gotten to go first, and the consequential dark scowl Stetler threw Horatio's way, the petite Louisianan nodded enthusiastically. "You'll never believe what I just found, H." She gave a dramatic pause then said, "the smoking gun."

Horatio cocked his head, giving a small smile, and responded, "you found the murder weapon."

With a laugh Calleigh corrected cheerfully, "not just that, but it was literally smoking. The perp though he could change the rifling by setting a fire inside the barrel." She loved how stupid some criminals were. "A neighbor saw it in a dumpster, thought it was fishy, and reported it. It matches the bullets found in both our victims."

Her supervisor, and friend, got the joke and his smile widened. "Okay. Let me know when you've finished processing it." Horatio turned his head to beam at her then turned back towards his office. "Will you come in, Detective?"

Calleigh agreed happily and headed down the stairs and back towards ballistics. She could have waited to report on her find but had been so eager to share the joke that she'd went up before processing. She was glad she had, too; Stetler had a habit of making Horatio's mood even darker these days.

xxx

As the door shut behind his unwelcome visitor, Horatio moved to place the desk between them. It was a psychological trick, imposing the sense of being the one in control of the meeting, as if he were the boss and Stetler the employee. Normally, Horatio tried to be more pleasant but he disliked the man intensely, especially as Stetler tried to drag H's team through the mud yet again.

Recently the IAB officer had tried to find something wrong with the new investigator, Ryan Wolfe. Stetler had followed Ryan around like a puppy, watching intently and scratching down notes at the oddest times. It had really gotten on the former patrolman's nerves, and Ryan had finally broken down and complained to Horatio that he had trouble doing his job with Stetler in the way. Horatio had demanded that Rick leave his people alone in the field, and the man had grudgingly obeyed.

Now Stetler appeared to be up to some new trick.

Turning Horatio faced the glass wall, looking over the lab. He cocked his head towards Stetler and, in an almost friendly tone, softly asked, "What can I do for you?"

The darker man slapped a thick file down on the surface of Horatio's desk, a wide grin nearly splitting his face. An almost a predatory glint showed in the man's eyes; Horatio couldn't help thinking what a shame it had been to lose him from the lab when Megan left and he, Horatio, had been promoted in her place. Stetler had been very good at getting confessions that were backed by the evidence.

"And this is?" Horatio's voice remained calm. He didn't reach for the file, allowing Rick his moment of apparent triumph. It seemed he thought he had found something on the lab, or one of its staff, and Horatio wanted the man to talk. An excited Stetler might give things away he normally would have hidden.

Like the older detective had hoped, Stetler didn't balk at sharing this time. He pushed the file towards Horatio and leaned forward. "Speedle was a dirty cop."

It was like a slap to the face, and before Horatio had reached for the file he felt himself stagger as if physically struck. Anger boiled up and it took a precious few minutes for the redhead to draw a cloak of calm around his self. Horatio rarely lost his temper and he didn't plan to do so for Stetler's enjoyment. The tone of Horatio's voice would have been a warning to all who knew him well but it only caused the other investigator to frown for a moment before smiling in a more triumphant manner.

"You had better have evidence of that, Stetler."

Horatio reached over and picked up the heavy file. He noticed the cover said _'Speedle, TJ'_ Glancing up from the file to Stetler then back down, he finally opened it. What he read threatened to send his anger right back through the roof. "Where did you get this?"

"Sounds like you already knew about it, Caine. Were you helping him? Was your brother?"

Head snapping up, blue eyes flashing fire, Horatio slapped the file shut and slammed it on the desk. He leaned forward over the desk so far, he could feel the other man's suddenly hitched breath on his face. "What . . . did . . . you . . . say?" The ice cold venom in his voice finally checked the IAB man, and Stetler faltered, looking off balance.

Finally, Stetler started to talk.


	10. Temperatures Rise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. Miami.
> 
> .

Eric Delko frowned softly as he carefully marked another comparison point on the printout of the fingerprint image. Moving back to the magnifying glass, he looked for other indicators to compare, concentrating hard enough to be oblivious to all around him. If he could prove the partial fingerprint from the garrote matched one on the suspect's ident card, it would be a big step in nailing the child murderer. One or two more markers and . . .

 _Damn_ . . . Eric sat back, a frown on his face. Brown eyes stared intently at the equipment, as if the man willed it to change what he'd seen. There was a loop to the distal ridge markings and the suspect displayed no obvious loops on any of his ten digits: a definite difference. Delko would have to keep looking; it appeared he searched for a different suspect after all.

The fingerprint analysis proved long, detailed work and Eric fervently hoped that they'd get the kinks in the upgrade to the AFIS site worked out soon; manual fingerprint comparisons were too slow, too exhausting, to do for any serious length of time. The fingerprint expert felt his respect rise a notch for those people who'd had to do this on a regular basis before AFIS and the World Wide Web.

With a sigh the Cuban-American bent to place his eye to the magnifier once more. The sound of someone entering the fingerprint lab had Delko glancing up before becoming once more immersed in his delicate work. He gave a bright smile to Calleigh. "Need something?"

Calleigh's frown made his smile slip in worry; he'd seen her practically bouncing just an hour previously.

"Stetler's been in H's office for over an hour now," the worried woman informed him. She glanced towards the steps leading up to Horatio's domain, the Plexiglas walls which constituted almost all of the crime lab's walls allowing her a slightly blurry view of her supervisor and his nemesis. "They've been arguing about something".

Surprised Eric followed her gaze, seeing the pair in the raised office. H seemed to be towering over the only slightly smaller IAB man, and both seemed to be in a rather heated debate. That wasn't like their normally calm, in-control boss. Eric frowned severely. "Think H is finally sick of that guy poking around here?" He wanted to say a whole lot more, especially concerning Rick Stetler's possibly questionable parentage, but he refrained, watching in increasing anxiety as Stetler finally left the office, slamming the door.

If those walls had been regular glass something would have shattered. As it was movement across the lab stopped and people turned to stare in surprise towards the loud disruption. Stetler hurried down the steps carrying a very thick folder; Horatio remained sequestered in his office staring at his computer screen.

Brown eyes met blue as Eric turned his frown on Calleigh. Both looked back up towards H's office. Finally they seemed to make a decision, though no words had been spoken. The fingerprint expert left his fingerprint cards and printouts on the desk as he headed for the door, and his boss's office, followed closely by the ballistics expert. They were joined within seconds by their newest investigator, Ryan Wolfe, who carried a sheaf of computer printouts tightly gripped in one hand.

xxx

Eyes quickly scanning the photocopied report on his desk, Horatio tried to concentrate wholly on what he was researching. He had to keep his mind clear, or he'd never be able to find the evidence to prove Stetler wrong. Speed had not been dirty, and Horatio planned to prove it. Tim Speedle, a dirty cop? He had been the most honest cop, aside from Ryan Wolfe, Horatio knew . . . there was no way Stetler's mass of information, confessions, and deals could be accurate. There had to be something out there to clear the name Rick Stetler was about to drag through the mud. Horatio refused to let one of his people go through such treatment, even posthumously.

The pounding in his ears caused by anger began to subside and Horatio immersed himself in the information before him. There wasn't anything in the report that the supervisor hadn't already seen a dozen or more times over the years but it didn't stop him from searching. Somehow Rick Stetler had found something on Speed, or found a way to back up a trump charge; any little sliver of information could contradict the smug IAB man's proof. One little discrepancy could blow Stetler's case to dust. Horatio only had to find it.

When Horatio had declared that he, as supervisor of the crime lab, demanded the chance to find evidence to contradict the charges, and subsequently demanded a copy of the entire file, Stetler had been livid. He'd slammed a photocopy on the desk; apparently the man had been prepared for such a contingency despite not liking it. He then stormed from the office, slamming the door with enough force to attract unwanted attention. It was only a matter of time.

A knock interrupted Horatio and the redhead frowned, glancing towards his door. There stood his three day-shift investigators, all looking worried or anxious or upset. Well, it looked like it was time already.

Horatio straightened leaving the file open. His quick mind saw the advantage of having the entire staff on this case thus he decided to include them. With a signal of one hand, Horatio waited for the team to file in and spread out once more. Before they could question him, H spoke, his voice soft, steady, once more under control.

"IAB has found evidence that the Miami-Dade Crime Lab may have been housing a dirty cop." Why mince words; the sooner they understood, the sooner they could try to clear their deceased friend and coworker. He reached down and pushed the file towards the three, noticing with approval that they didn't waste time arguing but moved directly to find out more information.

"No! This is wrong, H!" Delko's voice was instantly angry as he saw the name on the file: _'Speedle, TJ'_ "Speed wasn't dirty! You know . . . knew him better than to believe this trash."

"I . . ."

Calleigh's quiet, yet intensely indignant reply cut the supervisor off. "Where did he find this, H? He had to have based it on something."

"Calleigh!" The Hispanic Eric whirled on the blonde woman, anger flaring higher. "You can't possibly believe this shit?"

She looked calmly at Delko and shook her head, ponytail swaying with the movement. "Of course not, Eric, but Rick Stetler's a smart man. He'd have to have something to build his case on; an invented charge won't hold up even for Internal Affairs."

Ryan didn't say a word, knowing Speed only by reputation. Instead the young former patrolman looked through the file, reading quickly and flipping pages. His eyebrows shot up and he glanced at Horatio, ignoring the argument between the irate Eric, supporting his best friend all the way, and the calm Calleigh, playing Devil's Advocate. "H?" His query broke through the argument and the others looked over.

Horatio waited, knowing the obsessive officer may have found something with his detached investigation that closer hearts and eyes might miss.

"Speedle was shot in the chest, right?"

"That's right."

Glancing down at the too-thick sheaf of evidence papers, Ryan flipped through to the biographical statistics. "Alexx Woods would have done the autopsy?"

"Correct." Still Horatio calmly waited for Ryan to make his point.

"Then she'd be able to confirm or deny these marks, right?" Ryan pointed to the information on scars and tattoos Speed was listed as having.

Delko jumped in. "For law enforcement Speed had very few scars. I know. We've gone swimming together."

With a curious tilt to his head, Horatio looked at his longtime investigator and friend. "Go on, Eric; what marks did you notice . . . and when was the last time you saw him in his trunks?"

Stepping over to the desk, Eric looked down at the file and frowned severely. "First off, Speed's never had a surgery in his life, so this appendectomy scar is wrong. Tattoo? I think any one of us can confirm that he didn't have any tattoos on his back. He didn't have any, at all, unless his trunks covered them." The man looked at his boss intently. "Either Stetler's got the wrong information or he's got his head up his ass . . . I'm willing to bet on both."

"That doesn't sound right, Eric. Rick should know those details would be too easy to verify. After all, Alexx would have undressed Tim completely for the autopsy." Calleigh frowned, puzzled at the game Stetler apparently played.

A smile crossed Horatio's face and he reached for his cell phone. "Well, let's verify with Alexx, shall we?" He dialed the medical examiner who had been Speed's closest friend and the last person to see him undressed.

xxx

Slowly bringing her scalpel across the chest of the victim, making the standard Y incision many coroners used, Alexx Woods was surprised to hear the sound of her cell phone pierce the stillness of the morgue. With a frown she put the knife down and pulled off her glove then checked the name of her caller. _Horatio?_ It must be important if Horatio Caine was calling her. The woman turned back to her patient and leaned over, patting him with her still-gloved left hand. "I'll be right back, baby. You rest there."

She walked out of the room and into the small office provided for her current paperwork, drawing off the other glove as she moved. Once inside she flicked the phone on and said, "Alexx. What do you need, Horatio?"

Surprise registered in her deep brown eyes as her friend said, "I need you to pull Tim Speedle's autopsy file, Alexx. We've noticed some discrepancies that you may be able to clear up."

"What's this about, Horatio?" She reached into her filing cabinet and started flipping through folders, her fingers soon resting on the correct one. She had to brace herself to remove it. Even after four and a half months to get used to the idea, Alexx still had a tough time accepting that Tim was dead.

"Let me worry about that for now, okay?" Horatio's voice sounded cautious, his manner alerting her that this probably had something to do with Rick Stetler and Internal Affairs. If Horatio told her why he was rechecking the autopsy details, she might be accused of being biased.

With a sigh Alexx flipped open the file, touching the clear bag of autopsy pictures with a trembling finger. "Okay, Horatio." She took a breath, controlling the waver in her voice. "What do you need to know?"

"Did Speedle have any identifying marks, Alexx? Any scars or tattoos?"

Surprise registered on Alexx's face and she pulled the pictures from their protective bag. "Actually, yes; he had an appendectomy scar and no appendix." Flipping through the report, ignoring the pictures for now, Alexx came across the rest of what Horatio wanted to know. "And he had a tattoo on his right shoulder blade."

The silence from Horatio's end was so long, Alexx wondered if the call had been dropped. Finally the man spoke. "I'll need a copy of the autopsy report, Alexx, as well as any descriptions or photographs you have. I'll be down to sign for them shortly."

With a frown Alexx agreed then hung up.

Now that was a surprise. Obviously something bothered Horatio about Tim's identifiers. She thought back on that day over four months ago and once more puzzled over the inconsistencies in her knowledge and what she'd found. _What's IAB up to now? And why pick on Timmy?_


	11. Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, January 19, 2005. New York City.
> 
> .

Sliding a lab coat over the jumpsuit, letting Stella bag his shoes and socks, Danny frowned down at the generic booties he wore over generic white tube socks and his off-duty sneakers. More than just the accident with his evidence bothered him; he racked his brain to figure out who that new guy was. With a frown, briefly thankful his glasses hadn't been covered by the glop in the broken jar, Danny glanced up from the floor to Stella.

"Hey, Stella."

"Hey, Danny." She grinned at him, politely ignoring the damned cute lost-little-waif image he'd presented in the hallway a few minutes previously.

"Who is that guy? I know him."

At Stella's interested look he went on to clarify. "I think I met him at the academy or something; he's real familiar. Something about his voice . . . and those eyes . . ." A shudder wracked Danny at the remembrance of those intense brown eyes, and Danny's own blue ones widened in shock. _It can't be . . . No way he'd be allowed in law enforcement!_ A wash of dread overcame the investigator and he found himself waiting anxiously for Stella's explanation.

She didn't hold out for long, responding with, "His name's Joe Avery. You met him at the academy, Danny?"

Danny shook his head. "Don't recognize the name." Relief washed over him as quickly as the dread had. "He just looks like someone I knew, I guess. Someone . . ." he frowned, staring past Stella at nothing in particular, "from the old neighborhood."

"Who?"

The younger man had no idea why Stella was so interested but he had no intention of talking about his adolescence; especially as it pertained to a certain friend of his brother's. With a shake of his head Danny said, "No one important. I'll get those," and he took the evidence bag from Stella then hurried past the other investigator, ignoring her frown as he headed towards Trace and the new guy checking his clothes.

He was quite aware of Stella watching intently after him.

xxx

Stella watched as Danny headed into the trace lab, placing the evidence bag on the table next to an apparently oblivious Joe. She could see the blond man trying to watch the darker one but she could also see the tension in Danny's movements. He was nervous around Joe. It was a nervousness that seemed to go along with the flash of fear she'd seen in his eyes when he'd mentioned the old neighborhood. Her instincts told her Danny knew Joe the man . . . he wouldn't recognize the _name_ if the program had changed it. Judging by Danny's tone, and his expressive face, Danny didn't want it to be whoever he recalled.

Their potentially biggest lead so far was a vague memory; Stella weighed bringing the information to Mac. She knew Joe was supposed to be supervised, and leaving him with Danny might not be what Mac had in mind for supervision. On the other hand if Danny had a lead on why this man might be there or whether the lab was in danger, Mac wouldn't thank her for keeping it silent. Using her cell phone to inform Mac wouldn't work either; she couldn't let people overhear any conversation concerning Joe's connection with the program or Mac's investigation of him.

Stella finally hit upon a solution. She pulled out her phone and called Aiden's cell. Quickly she greeted the other woman. "Aiden? Mac wants Joe supervised until he's confident the man will work out. Could you partner him today?"

"I'm on a case, Stella . . ." the tone seemed puzzled, though, not hostile.

Stella added, "He's helped with the autopsy on your vic already. As soon as he's done with Danny's clothes he'll be yours to use." The pause on the other end told Stella that Aiden at least considered it.

"Okay. I'll baby sit him, Stella. He's gone to trace, right?" She seemed to be walking; Stella could hear her shoes on the hallway tiles. "I'm coming. Besides, if Mac thinks I'm ready to watch a newbie then who am I to argue? It'll help my ratings."

With a smile Stella thanked the dark-haired woman coming around the corner. With a wave of her phone, which Aiden copied, Stella turned for the DNA lab where Mac had brought the tubes from Aiden's victim. Slipping into the lab and throwing a smile to Jane, she said casually, "I think Danny knows Joe."

xxx

Mac's head snapped up before he carefully went back to signing the tubes over to Jane. He processed Stella's surprising statement as he wrote. _It can't be that simple. Can Danny really have the information they need about the new tech?_

"Thanks, Jane." Mac gave her a nod, passing the form back, and turned to his partner. He gestured for Stella to precede him from the DNA lab, following in her wake. They headed directly to his office and Mac closed the door behind them then turned to Stella and waited, knowing she would fill in the blanks without prompting.

"He's not happy to see Joe, Mac. I think . . ." she paused then continued, unable to find a better way to say it, "I think he's afraid of him."

"Danny's afraid of Joe? Did he tell you that?"

She shook her head. "No, of course not." Turning to watch as Mac moved towards the wall displaying the clearest view of trace, she added, "Danny asked me who he was and said he thought he knew Joe. At first he thought he'd met him at the academy, but then Danny said he knew him from the old neighborhood. I assume he means Staten Island where he grew up." When Mac turned to her she pushed the issue. "Mac, Danny looked afraid. I could see it in the way he moved, in his eyes. I think Danny recognizes Joe, and . . ." she sighed, her gaze flickering towards the trace lab then back to Mac's face, "I think Joe might be trouble after all."

Mac studied Stella's face for a long moment then walked over to his desk and pulled Danny's file from the bottom drawer. Flipping through it, Mac searched avidly for any information hinting that Danny might be in danger from someone in his past. There were no red flags so Mac closed the folder and went to his computer, again pulling up information on his hand-picked investigator.

As he read through the information he found Stella stood by radiating impatience. He knew she was probably struggling not to interrupt, but she wanted to know what he had found or what he was thinking. She'd have to wait; Danny's possible danger was more important than Stella's curiosity.

It took a few minutes to come to the conclusion that if he was going to find out if Joe was a threat to Danny, Mac would have to ask Danny, himself.

He raised serious blue eyes to meet the curious, worried green ones of Stella. "Stella, send Danny up to me? And keep an eye on Joe."

Stella nodded, her frown deepening. "I've got Aiden partnering him right now, Mac." But she left with that statement and Mac merely watched her go. He knew she'd keep Joe under wraps, especially now that she suspected the guy was a danger to normally fearless Danny.

Mac waited patiently for the younger man to make his way to this unexpected meeting: a meeting that promised to be unpleasant in the extreme.

xxx

"Danny, Mac wants to see you in his office."

Stella's voice sounded pleasant but Danny still frowned, looking away from the trace table. His eyes moved past Stella to look up at Mac's glass-lined office. With a nod, he pushed away from the table, disappointed he wouldn't get to see the rest of what Joe was doing; it was a procedure he'd never tried before. Giving Aiden a shrug as she turned puzzled eyes to him, the blond strode from the room and directly to Mac's office, climbing the stairs and knocking. With Mac's greeting, he entered and let the door shut softly behind him.

"You wanted to see me, Mac? I can tell you exactly what happened," and he hurried to explain the accident, fearing he was in trouble for the evidence destruction. "I was coming out of the DNA lab and..."

Mac cut him off, "You didn't see Kyle and the two of you collided. I'll be talking to both of you later about that."

Puzzled Danny sent a small frown Mac's way. "Then what do you need me for?" He wanted very badly to see that procedure despite his quickly suppressed reservations about the man, but how to tell his boss that he wanted to ditch an official meeting to watch a rookie work?

Silence started to weigh on the pair, and Danny became aware that Mac was thinking through his wording to whatever he wanted to say. Something serious was happening. With a frown Danny straightened his shoulders and waited for the ex-Marine to talk, knowing it'd be something he most likely didn't want to hear.

Finally Mac looked down at the trace lab, his voice firm but quiet as he asked, "Are you in danger, Danny?"

"What?" Danny was taken aback by the question and sent a quick look towards Joe in trace. He shook off the feeling of dread that wanted to overcome him again and looked back at Mac. "Did Stella say something?"

With a frown Mac stepped closer, looking his investigator in the eyes. "Are you in danger, Danny? I can't help if I don't know."

"I . . ." Danny ran a hand over his face, using two fingers to remove his glasses while he did so. Settling the frames back on his face, he shook his head. His tone became serious, low, intense. "I'm not sure, Mac. I think I've met Joe before but he wasn't going by that name. And if it is that guy . . . well, he shouldn't be here."

The darker man sat on the edge of his desk and nodded. "Tell me, Danny. What makes you think Joe's not who he says he is? Tell me about this guy you knew."

Uncomfortably Danny ran a hand over his hair and turned back to look down on trace, where Stella and Aiden seemed to be chatting with Joe. Stella watched the man work, intrigued, while Aiden seemed to be asking questions and smiling. For his part Joe seemed more oblivious to than aware of the two women as he methodically worked on the fluid stains on Danny's trousers. Without tearing his eyes from the sight, Danny answered in a low voice.

"I don't know much; I didn't hang out with him. He was a kid that moved into the neighborhood when I was a teen. He only stayed during the summers and was gone the rest of the year, but I don't know where he went." Danny looked to Mac, who nodded in a supportive fashion. "He used to run with one of the locale gangs, Mac, and a nastier guy you didn't want to meet. In fact, it was rumored that if you wanted something done, give it to Spedelli."

"Spedelli?" Mac's kept his voice, detached, as he watched the younger man.

"Yeah, TJ Spedelli. That's what he went by. I don't know if that was his real name or just a nickname. He used to run for the Mafia, for a couple of the gangs, and I once heard he ran for his life when he killed a guy." Danny kept his eyes on Mac now, his face full of raw emotion: misery and fear being chief among them. "If that's really Spedelli, Mac, he's trouble. He'll take the lab down and hard. If he's really a cop, Spedelli wouldn't be anything but a dirty cop. And if he's a tech, he's most likely using his science to run drugs like Meth." The blond looked back down to trace. "He had so much brains, he was terrifying. A guy like that could have run the neighborhood, even if he was just a teenaged shit that came down for three months every year. He walked and talked like he owned the whole Island and he had the brains to take it over if he'd wanted to."

xxx

Mac liked this less and less the more he heard. It started ringing all kinds of bells and whistles. Something about the guy screamed law enforcement and a dirty cop with ties to the Mafia and drugs would certainly merit the Witness Protection Program. Mac had to be sure, though. Many a man had his life ruined by assumption. He wasn't going to do that to a man based on a fifteen-year-old memory and a bad feeling. Joe Avery deserved a chance to prove himself, to defend himself . . . that was what America was all about. Innocent until proven guilty.

With a slow nod, Mac kept his seat but gestured Danny into a chair. "Why do you think this guy might be Spedelli?"

He watched as Danny sorted through his thoughts then blurted, "His eyes, Mac. I can't forget those intense eyes. It's enough to chill your soul the way he can look right through you." The younger man shuddered and Mac merely waited him out. Finally Danny explained further. "I haven't seen him in ages and he seems . . . different somehow, but TJ was as cold hearted a bastard as they come. If you didn't move out of the way, he'd give you that glare, and you just knew he'd be waiting around the corner to jump you."

Frowning Mac nodded, but his mind played with the unspoken words. _Has Danny been jumped by this TJ?_

Danny suddenly rose to his feet and started agitatedly pacing, his hands moving all around as if he couldn't find an anchor. "The kid was maybe my age, maybe a little older; I don't know. But he was scary as hell, Mac. He had this really dark hair he kept in a very short buzz, like a military cut. He'd always be dressed in old denim and a leather jacket, and he carried a knife in his pocket that would make a butcher proud. I never did figure out how he carried that thing without cutting himself."

"How well did you know him?" Mac's curiosity suddenly sparked at Danny's random comment. It sounded like he knew the boy better than he'd initially admitted to. Watching Danny's double-take almost confirmed the fact that he was hiding something, and possibly something important.

"I didn't, Mac, I swear!" Danny whirled to face his boss, his voice laced with pleading: pleading for trust, pleading for understanding. Mac frowned at him and Danny dropped his gaze, his head bowing as if in defeat. "He . . ." the words sounded forced, "he was a regular fixture in the neighborhood. You couldn't avoid him, even if you wanted to. I didn't run with him, Mac," his head came up, blue eyes begging for belief, "but I couldn't escape him, either."

The crime lab supervisor merely watched his employee for a long, silent moment. With a brief nod, he finally stood and walked over to the younger man. Putting a hand carefully on Danny's shoulder, Mac softly asked, "Do you want protection while I investigate him, Danny?"

As relief and a myriad of other emotions rapidly chased across Danny's expressive features, Mac wondered just what the FBI had gotten him into. This couldn't end well, that was certain.


	12. Investigations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Thursday, January 27, 2005: New York City. Friday, January 28, 2005: Miami.
> 
> .

Thursday, January 27, 2005: New York City:

Mac looked at the burned tattoo, _Tanglewood_ , and frowned softly. When asked if he knew about Tanglewood, he had to honestly reply, "No." He wasn't familiar with New York gangs especially Staten Island gangs. A sudden memory came back, a memory of Danny relaying information about a local Staten Island hood connected with gangs and Mafia, a Danny with fear in his voice, relaying that the hood had been rumored to have killed before. Mac looked up. "But I think I know someone who does." 

xxx

Thursday, January 27, 2005: New York City:

Danny watched the interview end and the officers lead Sonny Sassone out of the room. Sonny hadn't seen him behind the protective viewing glass, but Danny felt sure the other man knew he was there. The look on Mac's face at Sonny's parting comment: that the Tanglewood Boys knew all about Danny, that Danny knew all about them, made the blond want to cry. The trust he'd worked so hard to keep between himself and his boss looked like it was beginning to crumble right in front of him. Just last week Mac had asked him about his old connections; he should have mentioned the Tanglewood Boys then.

The need for trust had stopped him. The desire to just bury his sordid past and forget it ever happened had misled him. Now he was paying with more than his life; he was paying with the very hard won trust of Mac Taylor. How could he regain that trust? Was it too late? Making a very difficult decision Danny straightened his shoulders. It might not help, might sever the bond completely, but he'd do it.

With a deep, shaky breath, trying to steady his pounding heart, Danny headed for the interrogation room before either Mac or Stella could leave it. He opened the door, saw their expressions, and nearly lost his nerve. Gathering his courage once more, he walked in and shut the door. "Mac?" 

Mac waited, his expression closed, his manner wary.

Danny wanted to cry; his boss was so cold. He pressed on. "You asked me last week about that guy I knew when I was a kid? TJ Spedelli?" Interest lit Mac's eyes and there appeared to be a glimmer of something . . . was he willing to forgive Danny his secrets for this information about Joe?

"Spedelli was a Tanglewood Boy, Mac, one of the worst." He drew a shaky hand through his hair, unaware of the sudden worry crossing Stella's face. He had to push on. "Like I said, I didn't run with Spedelli . . . even some of the Tanglewood Boys seemed afraid of him. I think," and he looked Mac straight in the eyes, "I think even Sonny was scared of Spedelli." 

xxx

Thursday, January 27, 2005: New York City:

It wasn't what Mac had wanted to hear but it was something. Danny had given him more to work with and inadvertently given him a little more on Sonny Sassone while he was at it.

Mac hadn't yet told Stella what Danny had confided to him on Joe's first day, but he had told her that Joe might be dangerous. She'd trusted him and accepted the lack of information and continued to watch the man, or have Aiden or Adam do it, daily. Never once was Danny permitted to be alone with Joe Avery, just in case.

Now Danny had opened up a little more, given him even more information on TJ Spedelli, Joe's possible alternate ego. It looked worse every time a little more information was revealed. If it wasn't for Danny's fear, he'd demand the entire story. Mac felt the Tanglewood Boys had something over Danny . . . something that made Danny too afraid to talk; someone's life, perhaps?

With a frown, unaware of the impact the sudden, fierce expression had on Danny, Mac nodded. "Thanks, Danny." He didn't see the disappointment, the defeat, in the younger man's eyes as he turned and strode hurriedly from the interrogation room. Mac Taylor was too intent on pursuing this new lead.

xxx

Thursday, January 27, 2005: New York City:

Stella wanted to comfort the apparently crushed man still beside her. Mac's abrupt dismissal of him was cruel. But if Danny had been lying . . . and it certainly looked like he may have been . . . She trusted Mac, but she hated to see Danny this way; he was a good investigator and a good friend.

Sympathetically she touched the younger man's arm and said, "Do you need some time, Danny?" 

At his sudden jerk, as if slapped, then his subsequent head shake, she had to be content. Nodding Stella gathered her file and left the room. She would talk to Mac, see if she could help work things out between the two.

When she arrived at Mac's office, Stella could see he worked on his computer, a phone clasped between shoulder and ear. He was so thoroughly involved in work, she knew she'd have to talk to him later. But she would talk to him.

xxx

Friday, January 28, 2005: Miami:

It had been two weeks and the Miami investigators were still totally wrapped up with the IAB case, using their personal time as they had to. Between other cases they would meet in the layout room to confer with one another or to review the information so far gathered. Rarely did a meeting that contained all four detectives but once in awhile it worked out . . . like now.

Detective Horatio Caine stood by the layout table, reading over the shoulder of the much shorter Calleigh. She appeared not to mind, so he continued letting his eyes cross and re-cross the pages of the file, nodding for her to change the page when he was finished, waiting for her to catch up before she finally turned it. For their part, Delko and Ryan created a time line of Speed's life, using colored sticky tags to mark anything that would need more in-depth research.

As the team worked in harmony, trying to find anything to clear their friend and coworker, the jarring sound of a cell phone ringing interrupted them. Each went for his or her own phone while the sound continued. By the third insistent ring Horatio figured out that it was his cell and he answered it, sending a small smile to the rest of the team.

"Horatio Caine," his voice sounded calm, actually pleasant, despite the trying day and demanding work. His eyes widened as did his smile, and his voice softened to a near caress. "Hello, HR. What do you need?" 

Confused, Ryan turned to glance at Delko, mouthing "Who's HR?" 

Eric grinned and replied, in quite a normal tone much to Ryan's embarrassment, "HR's his son. Cute kid." 

"Okay," Horatio turned his back, still smiling, but no longer making it easy for the team to hear his end of the conversation.

"HR?" Ryan persisted.

Calleigh smiled and shrugged, looking back at the file before her. "It stands for Horatio Raymond. He's a junior, but I guess having two Horatio's in the same house was too hard, so they came up with a nickname." 

Ryan shook his head. "So, one's H, the other's HR. Uh, convenient." His voice gave away the fact that he found that a bit off. At Delko's laugh Ryan merely turned back to the time line.

"Did he?" The silky tone hardened but gentled a bit with his next question. "HR where are you?" After a pause to receive his son's response, the redhead continued in a careful tone. "All right. HR, I'll be right there, okay? Wait for me." 

With a frown Horatio listened again to the nine-year-old on the other side. Finally he said, "Bye-bye." He hung up lifting his blue eyes to scan his team as he turned towards them. "Ah . . . I have to go. Keep me filled in." Horatio left the layout room as his people watched.

The three remaining investigators turned puzzled looks on one another but went back to work without comment. Since Horatio's ex-wife had left their son with him a month before, there had been several times the boy had called during working hours. Twice, Horatio had even left the lab, though never a crime scene, on some personal business involving HR. It appeared to be another one of those times.

"What's this?" Delko's voice broke the silence, drawing Calleigh's attention from the file once more.

Reviewing what he'd just penned in, Ryan nodded. "I don't know. Maybe some type of summer camp or city-country exchange program?" 

Both men frowned at the data. Eric finally shook his head. "Maybe a summer camp, but New York City's an odd place to send a kid for his summer vacation." Quickly, Delko worked out the figures and said, "Speed was thirteen. That's a bit late to start going to camp." 

Another sticker joined the multitude of already marked areas. They would need to hunt down and verify a great deal of information in order to counter Stetler's charges. No one said it would be easy, but that was what criminal investigators did: find impossibly hard to locate evidence to solve the puzzles presented to them on a regular basis.


	13. Tangled Connections

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Wednesday, September 14, 2005: New York City and Wednesday, September 14, 2005: Miami.
> 
> .

Wednesday, September 14, 2005: New York City:

It had been nine months and they'd reached an impasse. In all that time the FBI and other law enforcement agencies had been giving Mac Taylor the run-around. He had long since gotten frustrated with the slow one-step-forward-three-steps-back lack of progress he made, and now he was angry though he didn't let it show. Neither Gideon brother was available to ask: Sergei was busy with the U.S. Marshalls and Alexi with the Secret Service. Without inside help Mac hadn't been able to pursue Joe's past to the depth he'd wanted to; not only due to the blockade set up by the Witness Protection Program but because Mac was continually interrupted by crimes which needed solving. He had to run a crime lab, guide a staff of investigators, and help the people of New York City. Instead he worked the case in his private time and kept a strict eye on Joe, preventing Danny from being with him alone. It was not a satisfactory solution to the problem.

Staring hard at the cursor, feeling impotent in the face of yet another response that didn't get him any closer to the truth, Mac finally reached over and clicked the button to close the electronic mail. He stood, rolled his neck and shoulders to try to get out the kinks, and strode to the wall facing the trace lab. The supervisor watched as Aiden laughed at something Joe said, his instinct to trust the man after nine months of working closely with the quiet man warring with his doubt about Joe's elusive past and Danny's fear of connections to the Tanglewood Boys.

Mac trusted Danny. The younger man kept things to himself and he'd been known to let his heart and emotions rule his otherwise sensible side, but he was basically an honest, trustworthy cop with a brilliant scientific mind. If Danny said there was a dangerous man out there who could tear apart the lab, Mac believed him. The only problem was that Danny's information didn't mesh with what Mac had seen of Joe Avery.

Perhaps Joe wasn't the threat. It had been years since Danny had heard of that Spedelli kid. It was very plausible that he'd mistaken their new man for the hood who'd terrorized Staten Island in his youth. Joe seemed more interested in cracking cases and finding evidence than wreaking havoc. If it weren't for the intensity the ex-marine saw burning under the quiet man's surface, the controlled movements and well-thought-out words, Mac would have questioned Danny's memory. But something told Mac that Joe could be dangerous if pushed, and so he weighed the necessity of going to Danny and asking for further proof of Joe's guilt against simply accepting the trace expert at face value.

That's what Joe Avery had become: their trace expert. They may not have originally needed him, but his arrival had been a boon. Even with the confusion and questions, everyone, including Mac, had to admit that this man was top of his field. Joe knew how to find evidence that no one else thought was there, as if pulling it from thin air. He was also familiar with police procedure. The paperwork on the man might say "lab technician", but Mac seriously wondered if Joe had been a CSI before the program.

The trouble was, despite his instincts, Mac still couldn't find out enough information about the guy to entirely convince himself that Joe Avery hadn't been dirty in his previous life. And a dirty CSI was as much a threat, if not more so, than a dirty cop or even an aging teenaged hood. Once dirty, a man rarely cleaned up permanently, which meant Joe was bad news for the lab. And if he wasn't dirty, but merely a witness awaiting a federal trial, where would the lab be once that trial took place and Joe was safe to resume his past life . . . if he'd ever be safe again? If he was in protection because he was hunted, that would endanger the lab just as much.

With a groan Mac covered tired eyes with a strong hand. His thoughts kept going in circles; he needed answers. And the roadblocks the feds kept throwing in his way had quickly turned his background check on one of his staff into a cold case investigation. Like all the cold cases sitting on the edge of his desk, there had to be something he'd been missing.

He reached for the personnel file next to the stack of crime files he kept on his desk. Flipping it open, he looked through the information he'd been provided by the FBI, knowing that ninety-nine percent would be the false cover-story they'd created. There had to be something, that one percent of truth, that elusive piece of information that could help him locate the real Joe Avery.

_"I had a bad run in down south and decided to relocate. I tried Maine, but that didn't work for me, so I came back to the city."_

Mac lifted his head, his eyes widening at the memory. _A bad run in down south_ . . . Joe had mentioned the south and there had been the remnants of a tan on him. He'd come to them near the beginning of January, but he'd looked like he should have been in a hospital. Was it possible that Joe, himself, had provided the key to his identity?

Flipping through to the background he'd been given, Mac saw Maine listed but nothing southern. Had the man slipped up and nearly given his true history? Opening to the medical section, Mac skimmed the facts provided then sat straighter. Heart condition. That would explain quite a bit of those early days: the slow movements, the unconscious chest massaging, the shortness of breath. However, a heart condition could be caused by more than disease . . . it could have been a serious injury as well.

Taking a chance, knowing it could lead to yet another dead end, Mac turned to his computer and flicked open his e-mail. He began typing, sending his request to all law enforcement organizations in Florida. He'd work his way north, if he had to, and west, if necessary. If he was right, however, someone out there might just have the information he needed to track down Joe's former life.

xxx

Wednesday, September 14, 2005: Miami:

"That's right. I'll be home around six." Horatio listened to the eager young voice on the other end of the conversation and smiled. HR was one of the bright spots in his life. With a soft laugh the red-haired man teased, "You're going to turn into beef stew. Okay, if that's what you want, I'll pick some up on the way home." Most kids would have begged for pizza or macaroni; trust his son to want something like stew. "All right, I'll see you then." He waited then laughed again, "Bye-bye." 

Hanging up Horatio turned his attention back to his team, his smile fading as he tuned back into their discussion. It was after hours, but for the last nine months they'd spent many extra hours off the clock investigating Speed, only taking a small amount of personal time for emergencies, such as Calleigh's rape in July. Every time Stetler came up with proof about Speed's dirty dealings, Horatio and his staff would find a way to block it. This cat and mouse game couldn't last forever, but none of them were willing to back down. It seemed that more than trying to take Horatio down, the IAB man had a personal vendetta against Speed, too.

Speed's known time line, from birth to death, had been posted across the layout room wall. Any time they found something more out, which wasn't very often, they added it to the graph. There had been numerous brightly colored sticky flags all over the chart when they first created it: markers to indicate something that needed verification. Now the stickers were very few, mostly pertaining to the summers of Speed's teenaged years. As far as they could figure out, from the age of thirteen until seventeen Speed disappeared every summer to New York City. What he did there, who he saw, even where he lived was information no one had managed to acquire. Rick Stetler could find the most damning evidence in that small time frame; Horatio had yet to find something to prove the man hadn't just disappeared from the face of the Earth all those months.

Calleigh stood in front of the time line, taking down yet a finally verified flag concerning the paralyzing accident of one of Speed's friends in his senior year of high school, up in Syracuse, New York.

Next to the time line were several autopsy photos from Alexx's private file. She had provided it in January, and Horatio had yet to return it: Alexx's private file didn't exactly coincide with the official file or even with Stetler's copy. There were major discrepancies concerning transport of the body, location of the bullet wound, and even time of death.

Alexx claimed the Chief Medical Examiner had arranged transport and hadn't given her the chance to proclaim time of death. From her photographs, Speed's bullet wound was a couple of inches above the heart. The bullet had been too badly damaged against the scapula to be of much use.

The official report listed Speed's time of death as somewhere near the time Horatio had heard his friend's heart stop. It said Alexx had received the body but didn't claim who had actually done the transporting. It also said his injury was to the left shoulder and was a through-and-through in which the bullet was never recovered.

To really confuse matters, Stetler's report listed Alexx as having claimed death shortly after arriving on scene at the jewelry store. It also said that the Chief Medical Examiner had arranged for her to meet the body at the morgue but that a rookie driver had been the one transporting and had made only one stop, to retrieve a second shooting victim from across town, before arrival. This report listed the bullet wound as being a through-and-through without bullet recovery but that the bullet had gone clean through the heart.

With three varying reports on Speed's death, a double red flag had been added to the time line to indicate the biggest discrepancy. They would have to get some answers soon. Horatio and Alexx had both tried but reached dead ends; however, they couldn't be stalled forever. They would eventually track down the rookie driver and compare notes. They only needed more time.

Since the autopsy reports were inaccurate, Delko and Ryan looked at the autopsy photos on the wall. They checking every detail of the body in the photos, recording anything odd they might notice. Delko's list was far longer than Ryan's, having known Speed for many years. Due to that knowledge of his best friend, he was firmly insisting that Speed didn't have any marks when they'd last been swimming, despite Alexx's clear pictures of the appendectomy scar on his right abdomen and the tattoo across his right shoulder blade.

Horatio watched as Ryan gestured to the most detailed of the autopsy photos, pointing at the tattoo once more. "When was the last time you saw him without his shirt?" 

"I told you," Eric's got down to the business of defending Speed yet again, "last September, not too long before this was taken, maybe a week or two." 

"So, it had to be new?" Ryan asked. 

Shaking his head, Eric looked at his current partner. "Not too new. It would have to be covered with Vaseline and a bandage if it was only days old. Within two weeks it needs to stay moist and heal a little. And even straight black ink like that might take more than one sitting to do." He frowned intensely. "Maybe we should check with local parlors, just in case?" 

With a nod of his head, Ryan added, "It says _Tanglewood_. Isn't that the name of a music festival in Massachusetts?" 

Calleigh looked over at the other investigator, intrigued. "Is it?" 

He nodded. "Yeah, it was named after Nathaniel Hawthorne's book _Tanglewood Tales_ , actually. Is that a date?" Ryan peered closer at the top left of the tattoo, closest to the spine.

"Yeah," Delko also stared at the intricate design. "It says June 24, 1989. Hey, Speed's birthday was June twenty-fourth." 

"He would have been sixteen. It says here that he was born in 1973." 

Both men glanced over at Calleigh but the sight of Horatio off the phone drew the attention of all three. The supervisor smiled at them, "Okay, what have you discovered?" 

Returning his smile, Calleigh pointed to a date on the chart before her. "Speed's tattoo has his sixteenth birthday and the name of a Massachusetts festival worked into it. That falls right into his missing teen years." 

Horatio slipped his hands onto his hips, pushing his jacket back at the same time. He nodded, tilting his head a bit. "All right, we need to check that festival and that date. There may be something more significant about it than we see so far. Ryan, I'll leave that to you." He slid his blue eyes to Delko and said, "Check with the local tattoo parlors to see if anyone remembers a man of Speed's description coming in. Take a photo from last summer with you. A six foot man with dark hair might not be an uncommon sight, but people tend to remember Speed . . . especially if he was getting a tattoo with a date on it." The redhead turned to the petite blonde woman. "Calleigh, I need you to continue going over the paperwork for those missing summers. If you find anything that can definitely be proven or disproven, not merely hearsay, I want it. He went to the city. It may be time to check with the city law enforcement. I'll handle that." 

He removed his hands from his hips and slipped his sunglasses over his eyes. "I want definitive proof concerning those gun running charges against Speed, team." He walked from the lab.


	14. Natural Diversions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Friday, September 16, 2005: New York City.
> 
> .

_09-14-2005: Caucasian Male; 6'0"; eyes brown; hair brown or black; heart injury or disease approx. Sept. 2004 to Dec. 2004; know police procedures and criminal science investigation techniques; possible witness or suspect; Urgent; Contact: Det. M. Taylor, NYPD._

The message had gone out, and he'd received several responses from all over Florida, Georgia, and Alabama. Police departments of all sizes, crime labs, even the occasional bounty hunter had all responded with "No present information; will keep look out." Some departments had yet to respond, but Mac kept sending it out, spreading the search further. Either he'd finally locate someone who had information, or the FBI would step in and put an end to his fishing.

At present Mac was not near his computer or even concentrating on his search for Joe Avery's background. He was in the largest conference room the police department possessed surrounded by all three investigation shifts as well as the lab staff. They listened to the proposition being set forth by the Police Commissioner, Mac's boss.

"So, in preparation for another Katrina, we're taking advance volunteers to go to the possible trouble zones to help local law enforcement and rescue personnel. We'll be getting in a minimum number of replacements from other labs with larger staffs or lighter workloads, so don't be afraid to volunteer. This will not be a paid volunteer service but you will still receive your normal pay for administrative leave." With a flourish he finished, "People gathered together to help after Hurricane Katrina. They gathered together to help in the Tsunami after Christmas. And they gathered together to help us," he gestured out the window at the vast cityscape of New York City," when terrorists hit the Trade Center. Let's show our support and help out, too."

Applause cascaded around the room but Mac did not join in. Tropical Storm Rita may be a disaster waiting to happen, but it was hardly right to compare a storm to a terrorist attack. The sentiments were fine; the New York police _should_ help, but the Chief had picked a very poor comparison point in the former Chicago-native's opinion. With a frown Mac kept his hands to himself and politely waited for the next part: where the Chief released them to put their names on lists and asked the supervisors to adjust schedules around the missing team members.

True to every disaster meeting Mac had ever attended, when the Commissioner got his fill of adulation he nodded and raised his hands. "Okay, you can all go now. Tell your supervisors if you want to volunteer. Supervisors, be generous. We can cover a good number of experienced people volunteering so please take that into consideration. I won't be able to stay. I have many places to go and departments to talk to, but I will leave you with the Chief for any questions you may have. Thank you and God bless New York!" With another enthusiastic burst of applause from the crowd, the Commissioner left the room.

"That sounded more like a campaign speech to me." Stella's voice was tinged with the same disgust Mac felt.

He turned blue eyes to meet green and offered a tired smile. "So, do you want to go to Florida, Louisiana, or Texas?" He was teasing her and so was surprised when she responded, "Florida, Mac. Sign me up for hurricane volunteer."

The woman must have noticed his surprise because she laughed. "Don't tell me you're not going to take the opportunity to help out the south in their time of need? The Commissioner might have been making it a carnival, but they do need help. Katrina wasn't that long ago, and Rita's projected to hit the same areas. They'll need police and rescue now more than ever."

"I'll go," came Danny's voice from Mac's other side, and the ex-Marine turned his surprised look on the blond.

"You want to slosh through polluted water and sewage to try to identify dead bodies and reconstruct water and power?" It was fine to get the morale up and the volunteers coming in, but Mac felt that the Commissioner should have outlined the real expectations and not the _'glory'_ of helping those less fortunate. "You'll need all your shots up to date, and then some, Danny. You'd better bring a spare pair of glasses in case yours get damaged. I can guarantee they won't have optical services for months down there. There will be infection, pollution, and no running water or electricity." He turned fully to the younger man, ignoring the frown on his face. "People will be fighting, even killing, for one bottle of water and for the C-rations the National Guard will try to distribute. You'll have looting and even some rioting in the worst places. And most likely, instead of police work you'll be stuck on body retrieval and storage. Bag and Tag, Danny, is that what you want to do?"

Danny's spine stiffened, but Mac could see the other man was seriously rethinking his position.

Mac turned his eyes to the rest of his investigative and lab staff, all of who had quieted to listen when he'd dressed down Danny. "Look, I'll take the names of any man or woman that wants to volunteer and God Speed to you all. But you better realize now, before you get down there, what you're getting into. If you still want to go down there, knowing the truth, I'll be proud to send you to the strike zone. If you volunteer, you're in it for the long haul, people." He wasn't even aware that he'd fallen into a very old habit: that of Marine, briefing his troops before a dangerous mission.

A very long pause ensued with the staff looking at anything and anyone except Mac. Even the Chief didn't contradict the crime lab supervisor; he preferred the volunteers to know what they'd be getting into. Finally Stella broke the awkward silence, her voice sure and steady.

"Put me down, Mac. I'll go help during Rita."

Turning his eyes to study his partner and best friend, Mac met her steady gaze. He studied her for a long moment then nodded. "Stella Bonasera. Anyone else?" He kept his worries to himself for the moment.

Several people who had clamored to go before sheepishly hung back. Mac pretended he didn't notice. When presented the hard facts, most people found they didn't want to be anywhere near a natural disaster zone; they were more comfortable staying at home and sending money for the relief efforts. That was fine; the funds would be needed, too.

"I'll go, Mac." Again Danny's voice was adamant. Mac nodded, this time not questioning the man. He pulled forth the yellow legal pad he'd brought to the meeting and wrote down the two names he'd received. Looking up, letting his eyes rove the room, not singling any particular people out, he waited for any more volunteers.

Surprise once more laced the crime lab supervisor as he heard Joe's steady voice call out, "Put me down, Mac. I've done hurricane rescue before." Mac met Joe's steady gaze, holding it for a long moment before he finally bent to write the man's name. He followed this, silently, with his own. If Joe was going, Mac would be there to keep an eye on him. He'd have to trust his Night Supervisor to run the lab in his absence. He wondered if Johnny would be able to take Connor for the duration.

"Count me in, Mac. I've done body recovery in sewers before." Aiden's voice sounded firm underlain with a hint of laughter. The woman from Brooklyn was tough, never backing down from even the nastiest crime scenes. She could be relied upon to work the disaster area without shirking. Her tone, too, did wonders to relax the staff once more. It was a serious discussion, but somehow the light laughter had eased the tension and a few more names were added after Aiden's, though none of the newer volunteers were investigators; they were lab staff.

Finally, Mac looked up. "If that's it, I'll meet the volunteers in my office in an hour. You'll need to get prepared to leave. Any questions can go through me or the Chief. Until then, back to work, and . . ." he looked over each of the people he worked with then firmly stated, "Thank you." He left the room.

xxx

Joe, awaiting the Hurricane Rita meeting Mac had set, began working in the trace lab once more quite conscious of the other tech by his side; Adam was a nice guy. Joe realized that he would naturally be on a probationary status since he was so new . . . but after nine months? And did it have to be so blatantly obvious that they were babysitting him? Of course it was much more pleasant when Aiden Burn or even Stella Bonasera was the babysitter, but it still annoyed the dark-haired tech. He remembered a time when he had been one of the most trusted . . . _ah well, apparently that life is over._

Not that Joe had volunteered to give up his life or his freedom. He hadn't done anything wrong except forget to clean his service weapon. Medical science had helped him live, but he still paid for the stupid neglect. It had been a hard, very painful lesson, and he hadn't forgotten the little things again; in fact he kept a list to check off daily just so he wouldn't slip up. But, the watchful babysitting was grating more each day. Seeing Mac sign up for the rescue duty only after Joe had volunteered made it even more obvious that the supervisor didn't trust him; that rankled more than the in-lab-sitter he was always assigned.

There was something that bothered Joe even more than the constant guard, however.

One of the investigators, Danny Messer, wasn't allowed in the same room with him unattended. It had only take a couple of days to figure out that the blond man whose clothes he'd processed that first day was afraid of him. Joe couldn't figure out why; maybe it had something to do with that old serial killer case. In his past life he'd had to keep in constant communication with Danny to help solve a serial murder that was taking place between the two jurisdictions. _Could Danny have recognized my voice? How had it changed to fear? It's not like I ever threatened Danny._

With a sigh, Joe bent to study the fiber in the comparison microscope.

Ever since waking up in the hospital, things had been weird, confusing. First he had been dumped into a hell hole; Joe was beginning to believe that first agent had actually been hoping he'd die before the program had time to get back to his case. Then along came Agent Gideon, who still struggled after nine months to get him the proper funds and credentials, like a driver's license of all things. Ivana had a file on him that had all the wrong information, but he'd been too drugged to be able to form much of a response to the obvious conflict in data. Now he was in a place that any sane person in the program would have kept him far from, working under practically house arrest, and feared by a man he'd only talked to for one case and thought he'd had a good rapport with. The sum up didn't make things any clearer.

Unless . . .

Slowly straightening up, Joe's dark brown eyes widened, fixing on a point beyond sight. _It can't be . . . can it? Has the program actually confused more than my identifying marks? Have they mixed me up with . . .?_

Jumping to his feet, startling Adam who'd been going on about his date with a saucy redhead the night before, Joe headed for the door.

Screw this witness protection thing. He had no intention of letting the FBI railroad him if they'd gotten him mixed up with someone else, especially with a guy who, for all intents and purposes, didn't exist anymore. Joe wasn't proud of all his decisions in his life but leaving that hoodlum behind was the smartest thing he'd ever done. He wasn't about to start paying for the mistakes of a very delusional youth misspent on the streets of New York City . . . not since leaving that problem behind almost fifteen years ago.

Reaching for the door, he was startled by Mac Taylor opening it and stopping, a surprised look on his boss's face.

xxx

Mac rocked back on his heels as he nearly collided with Joe Avery. Wiping the surprise from his features, he frowned at the taller man. Avery looked like he was in a hurry, a dangerous look in those intense dark eyes. Mac could understand how Danny would be haunted by them. Somehow dark eyes like that always seemed to be evil, despite knowing that eye color didn't denote the personality inside.

"Joe, I need to see you in my office." He kept his voice controlled, professional, and saw the double-take from the other man. Ever since meeting the man, Mac had noticed that Joe had a way of weighing everything he did or said. This time, however, Joe seemed to jump at the chance to meet with his supervisor. Mac didn't let on how surprising that was.

"Yes, good, I want to talk to you, too, Mac."

The ex-Marine turned and led his newest employee towards the office, climbing the stairs and preceding him into the glass-lined room. With the coming volunteer service, Mac determined to simply ask Joe about his past. Mac had to be sure he wasn't taking a dangerous felon with him, especially since no one would be available to protect Danny. Once inside the supervisor's office, Mac signaled Joe to shut the door, which he did immediately.

Getting the jump on the obviously upset man, the crime lab supervisor stepped behind his desk and calmly asked, "So, what's on your mind, Joe?" He would see how this went before flinging his accusations and questions at the other man's head.

As if the man suddenly realized where he was and what he was doing, the intense look faded from Joe's eyes. He shoved his hands into his pockets, ignoring the fact that he still wore his gloves. Hunching slightly, as many tall men had a habit of doing, the dark-haired tech looked anywhere but at Mac. A couple of minutes passed, with Joe looking around and Mac merely waiting patiently, before finally the younger man spoke.

"After nine months, I'd think you'd know I don't need a sitter, Mac."

The ex-Marine stated calmly, "Your background check hasn't come through. Could you tell me why you're in my lab instead of where you were before?" Joe seemed to think through what he wanted to say and Mac wondered if he'd simply get the false cover story the FBI had provided.

He was surprised when Joe softly said, "I used to live in Florida. I was in a jewelry store when a shoot-out happened, and I was shot in the heart." Mac watched as Joe shook himself and stood taller, staring the ex-Marine in the eyes. "I have no idea what I stumbled onto, Mac, but now I'm here."

Mac watched him for a long moment, mentally noting that he'd have to update his information request if this conversation didn't stay this informative. He quietly asked, "Who is TJ Spedelli?"

As if struck, Joe flinched. It was more than obvious he recognized the name, which didn't bode well. Mac frowned.

Finally Joe answered, but his tone was wary. "He was someone I knew long ago . . . I haven't seen him since high school. He should be dead, but . . ." Joe met Mac's eyes with a straightening of his shoulders. "I'm _not_ TJ."

Suddenly a loud knock on the door caused both men to jump.

A fierce expression crossed Mac's face and he looked over, seeing the rest of his volunteers. With a sigh Mac signaled Joe that the conversation would have to wait. This certainly was not the end to his investigation of Joe Avery . . . or TJ Spedelli.


	15. The Storm Builds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monday, September 19, 2005: Miami and Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami.
> 
> .

Monday, September 19, 2005: Miami:

_Interesting._

Horatio softly frowned at his computer screen. He had been too busy that month working several odd cases and dealing with the information he'd had about his brother to actually take much time for personal messages. He hadn't even gotten a chance to open most of his email over the past week due to the case load, and then with the shooting that morning at the church he was lucky to have time to breathe, let alone read mail. If he had been able to get to it sooner, this would have been the top of his priority list for responses.

_09-14-2005: Caucasian Male; 6'0"; eyes brown; hair brown or black; heart injury or disease approx. Sept. 2004 to Dec. 2004; know police procedures and criminal science investigation techniques; possible witness or suspect; Urgent; Contact: Det. M. Taylor, NYPD._

With a flick of a couple of keys, he opened a reply message and wrote back, "Mac, now why would you be interested in Tim Speedle? He died last September and won't be able to testify." It wasn't as much depth as he would have normally provided the supervisor of the New York City Crime Lab, but it was all he had time to do. It provided some information so Mac could verify if that really was who he looked for. Horatio was willing to bet that Speed was precisely who Mac investigated; he hoped Stetler wouldn't get wind of this new twist too soon. Horatio hit the enter key, sending the message to his northern-based colleague.

He'd have to ask Mac about it later, as well as add it to their on-going internal investigation. Right now he was dealing with the ramifications of the new Mala Noche mafia that had sprung up in Miami and the preparations the crime lab for Hurricane Rita. Already a mandatory evacuation of much of southern Florida had been called; the high winds and waters of the vicious storm constantly assaulted the Keys. There were no guarantees where this particular hurricane would make landfall, and no one was taking chances especially since Hurricane Katrina had ravaged the projected target zone at the end of August just that summer.

The ringing of his cell phone sharply drew his attention and he flicked it on. "Lieutenant Horatio Caine."

The sound of the voice on the other side worried him. HR was a typical ten-year-old with all the dreams and fears of the young, but he was particularly brave when it came to facing new situations. To hear his son, in tears, talking about the news reports was disturbing. "HR, listen to me. I don't want you to worry about that right now, okay? Turn off the television." He waited and heard a click signaling that his son had obeyed. "HR? Everything will be fine. I promise."

"But she might be hurt."

 _She might be hurt?_ "Who?" He'd thought the boy had called about the hurricane, but apparently he had misunderstood through HR's tears. "Your sitter? HR, tell me who's hurt." Horatio walked quickly from his office and down the steps, flagging Delko as he passed the other man in the hallway.

Without question Eric fell into step behind his boss.

"Mom. I think she's hurt."

"Why do you think your mother's been hurt, HR?" _This involves Peg?_ The tall redhead wondered just how the boy had gotten onto that subject; HR hadn't even mentioned his mother since she'd dumped him on Horatio last Christmas. "Did someone call you?"

HR's voice crackled over the line, tears starting again. "No, but she never calls me. She left to go take pictures of the desert and she's still not back. She's never left me this long before."

 _Never left me this long before_ . . . Horatio wanted to demand just how many times his ex-wife had dumped her son on people, but he refrained. Right then it was important to calm the boy down, apparently not needing Delko's help after all, which was both a relief and a minor embarrassment. "She told you she's taking pictures of a desert, HR?"

Eric's suddenly realized they weren't going to a crime scene. The rescue diver-turned-fingerprint expert was in a good mood and grinned at Horatio's apologetic look.

Horatio watched as the dark-haired man nodded to him and broke away, heading for the hallway that led towards ballistics. The supervisor turned towards the presently empty trace lab, feeling a small tug of depression as a quick memory of Speed thrust forward. Even after a year he missed the scruffy investigator; then again, for the past nine months Rick Stetler's investigation had done little to ease that burden of loss. Mac's message hadn't helped, either. Pushing away the sudden grief, Horatio made a mental note to check with Mac at a later date about possible leads on Speed's teen summers. His other calls to New York had met dead ends.

His son's voice brought his attention back to the here-and-now and instant regret at his neglect welled up. At the least he should listen to HR's answers when he asked the child a question. "I'm sorry, HR, could you repeat that?"

"Dad!" The exasperation would have been amusing at another time if the conversation hadn't been centered around Peg and her abandonment of their son. "I said that she was going to the desert on Safari and was taking pictures of elephants and lions. She promised that I'd get something neat from Africa when she came back."

Anger swelled and Horatio worked to calm himself. In an unintentionally cold, hard voice, the father told his son, "She lied to you." That quieted the boy, and Horatio felt instantly guilty. He hurried on to explain, "She went to Iraq to report on the war. I suppose she didn't want to scare you, so she made up the story about Africa." This was a conversation that should have taken place face-to-face not over a cell phone connection while he was needed to help prepare for landfall of a hurricane.

The silence between the two dragged on for almost a minute before HR cut through the stillness. His voice sounded small as he asked, "Was she killed, Dad? I'm almost grown up; you can tell me."

Horatio's heart nearly broke for his son. With as much confidence as he could, the red-haired man gently answered, "I don't think so. They would have told us if she'd been hurt. She's fine, okay?"

Another pause threatened to stretch between them, but HR suddenly responded, "Okay, Dad . . . I . . . I believe you. Um . . ."

The investigator smiled sadly at his son's tone. It was apparent that the child wanted to believe in someone so much that he was willing to make that someone the father he'd met less than a year before. Obviously Peg had more than neglected the boy in her pursuit of a journalism career. "Yes, HR?" the man prompted.

"Um," HR paused once more then asked, "Will you be late today? The sitter wants to know."

With a sigh Horatio replied, "Yes, I believe so. We're getting the lab ready for the storm. I'll try to get home tonight, though."

The ten-year-old incredulously asked, "You're going to sleep at the lab? Can I?" The pleading in his son's voice made Horatio's smile widen.

"That may not be a good idea, HR. The lab isn't prepared for children." He could hear the disappointment in his son's "Okay," but let it go. HR was fascinated by cops and their work and had begged often to go with his dad to the lab instead of to school. Horatio had turned him down gently every time. Maybe after the hurricane season he could bring the child in for an hour or two; Horatio didn't say anything not wanting to give the boy false hopes in case he couldn't work it out.

"Well, okay, Dad. I'll . . . I'll see you when you come home, right?"

Horatio laughed softly, trying to ease his son's disappointment. "I promise. I'll even wake you up if you're asleep. Okay?"

"Okay. Bye."

"Bye-bye." Horatio hung up his phone, pocketing it as he once again left the empty trace lab.

xxx

Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami:

_"Mac, now why would you be interested in Tim Speedle? He died last September and won't be able to testify."_

With a frown Mac shut his laptop and unplugged from the airport's internet café port. He noticed the team getting back with their luggage, acknowledging that Stella had also retrieved Mac's while he checked on his messages from New York. Standing the head of the New York Crime Lab moved to meet his people, troubled by the cryptic message Horatio Caine had sent him.

 _Tim Speedle_ : that could easily be a bastardization of TJ Spedelli. It wasn't a large leap to switch around a couple of letters and change the Italian pronunciation to a more neutral sounding name. He had to test that theory, and, perhaps unintentionally, Horatio had provided the means for him. Now how to approach Joe with the question without sounding like a totally callous bastard? He didn't want the entire team to think he was investigating the man even during rescue duties.

Already there were reports of the hurricane terrorizing the Florida Keys; it had been upgraded from tropical storm at about eleven that morning. Miami-Dade and Brower counties were under evacuation orders, so the roads should be pretty clear going into the area. Landfall wasn't expected quite yet but there were still homes without power left from Katrina. They'd be busy helping the other volunteers and the local law enforcement batten down.

Setting out on their way to the car rental area of the Orlando International Airport, the team tried to determine which vehicles would be best for the circumstances. They wanted something with traction and pull, in case they were needed to tow, but they wanted something with enough space to house victims and a top that could protect them from the severe weather. Mac hadn't joined the debate and was surprised when Joe turned to him expectantly.

"I guarantee, Mac, down here Hummer's the way to go."

After a long moment Mac Taylor nodded, not questioning Joe's authority on the situation. The man had basically admitted to working in Florida, as well as doing hurricane rescues. Unless Joe had been lying, he had the most experience of the small staff. Aside from Joe, whom Mac had personally requested by his side, only the criminal investigators would be heading into the Miami-Dade area; the technicians were joining local police and heading towards the panhandle where Mac felt they were needed more.

"Three Hummers then; Stella will take the one with the equipment. I'll partner Danny, and Joe can go with Aiden." He could see the look in Joe's eyes; it said _'Still babysitting me?'_ but Mac ignored it and waited while Stella talked to the clerk at the rental counter.

Finally they were on their way towards the parking area.

Danny's voice called out from where he walked next to Mac, startling Mac out of his thoughts. "Hey, remember May of last year? The Penrod case . . . the one that Lieutenant Caine from Miami-Dade came up to help us with? We'll finally get to meet his guys."

Mac couldn't see Joe as the man walked behind him next to Aiden. Quickly, Mac dropped back as if to explain things to their newest member. "There was a killer that went from New York to Miami on a hired hit. He botched it and got the wrong family. When he came back, he killed another family. We were also able to link the man to the murder of an under-cover officer. Since the case crossed both jurisdictions, the head of the Miami Crime Lab came to New York to pursue the killer, and we had to work together to solve it."

Joe merely nodded; no indication of recognition on his face.

Interrupting happily Danny continued his vocal train of thought, turning his head so he could be heard clearly. "Well, I spent hours on the phone with Caine's man Speedle. We agreed to trade trace tips if we ever got to meet. Think he'll remember?" The blond was apparently quite excited to be out of New York, something he didn't often get to do, despite the prospect of what they would face when the hurricane made landfall.

However, inadvertently, Danny had also given Mac the opening he needed. All seriousness, the supervisor called back, "You won't be able to talk to Speedle, Danny."

The other man turned, walking backwards, frowning as he asked for an explanation. "We'll be busy, yeah, but we'll be working right next to the guy, Mac. They can't stop us from talking."

With a shake of his head, eyes showing the regret he felt at the reaction he knew he'd cause in Danny, Mac clarified, "He died last year." Danny's mouth dropped and he stopped walking; Mac added, "I don't have all the details, just the information Caine provided, which was that Tim Speedle died last year."

Joe's expression went from wary to shuttered as Aiden and Stella started discussing a fellow investigator's death. Danny seemed as upset as Mac had thought he'd be, frowning and pulling in on himself in a rare show of self-preservation; normally Danny wore his heart on his sleeve. Mac's own frown deepened as he tried to interpret Joe's reaction.

They reached the waiting vehicles before anyone could come to grips with the surprising news.


	16. Discoveries

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Monday, September 19, 2005: Washington DC: late night and Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Washington, DC: early morning.
> 
> Note: Anyone remember this poor neglected soul?
> 
> .

September 19, 2005; Washington DC; late night:

Too frustrated with the stonewalling she'd been getting on the Avery case, Ivana Gideon found it increasingly difficult to get much satisfaction out of the last ten months of work. As a Federal Profiler, she was pretty much in constant demand all over the nation, but with each success was the overshadowing, continuing failure to help one particular man: Joe Avery, the Federal Witness whose life she had saved. Especially grating were the constant blocks apparently thrown in her way by her supervisor, Agent Jonathan Fredericks. She could almost believe that he wanted Joe to fail in the program, but that made little sense; Fredericks was the one who'd had Joe put in the program in the first place.

Still there were things that bothered her about how the case had been, and apparently was still being, mishandled. Primary on the list of wrongs was the fact that Joe had been assigned to New York, a place he'd lived in his past, and a job in a police crime lab, something that jeopardized his entire new identity if the New York police recognized the man. Also he'd never actually received the starting funds he was supposed to have gotten. He'd been inducted into the program with a hole through his heart but received only the bare minimal of medical treatment which the program had apparently balked at paying for; at least a month of his health care had come at Ivana's own expense, and she was still paying off those bills . . . without Federal reimbursement.

Aside from the location, missing funds, and lack of health care, however, was the most disturbing notion that Fredericks didn't seem to think Joe Avery needed protection. This fact had become rather blatant over the last week. The head of the New York City Crime Lab, a detective Taylor, investigated a man very similar to Joe, and he'd made no secret of his search; it was likely someone had finally recognized the man from his previous life. It was only a matter of time before the detective got a response from the right people and Joe's new identity would be shattered.

Gun runner-turned-state's evidence or not, Joe had to be protected so he could appear on the stand, and Ivana intended to see him get that chance. In order to do that, though, she had to get the man some protection, had to put an end to the inquiries by detective Taylor, had to get those funds he needed to follow up for his heart. It had been a miracle he'd survived at all; he couldn't count on miracles to keep him alive too long, even with a staid, boring lab job.

Her musings were interrupted when a disruptive buzzing sound filled her office. Glancing up, a frown on her pretty face, the blonde agent called out expectantly, "Come in." By now people should know that when her door was shut, she was immersed in a case, even if they wouldn't know it was the Avery case Fredericks had so foolishly assigned her ten months ago.

_Speak of the Devil . . ._

When the door opened it revealed the lean, almost predatory features of her boss, Agent Fredericks. Dark green eyes, comparable in color to the thick, old fashioned glass used long ago for soda bottles, seemed to bore right through a person. Black hair, liberally sprinkled with white, was slicked back in a style reminiscent of the old greasers from the 1950's. His suit was always impeccable and he wore it like he had been born to it. With a walk that was more strut than stroll, and a way of keeping his hand on his service weapon, Fredericks resembled some mob family survivor always on the lookout for the old gang to hunt him down now that he flipped to the side of the Feds.

As always Ivana had to push the unflattering image away.

"Yes, sir?" Her Scandinavian accent, a heritage received from her first generation American parents, always sounded stronger in the presence of her abrasive supervisor. He had a way of making her feel like an outsider which naturally made her angry. She had as much right to be in . . . Ivana pushed away the old defensive argument. It wouldn't do to rub Fredericks the wrong way when she was trying so hard to get him to help Joe.

With a frown that threatened Ivana's normal calm Fredericks called out, "I'm going to New York to check on that Avery case you've been whining about. Hope you're happy, Gideon." The man sauntered back out of the room.

Ivana sighed and went back to typing on her computer still searching for more information about Joe's case, which was pretty sketchy at the moment, "Yes, sir."

_He picked a fine time to look into this,_ she thought sarcastically. _Nine o'clock at night . . . he'll need to catch a late flight, so he won't be able to see Joe until tomorrow morning._

xxx

September 20, 2005; Washington DC; early morning:

_03:00_

Ivana groaned as she glanced at her office wall clock: another long, sleepless night. Her doctor was going to kill her. Joe better appreciate what she was doing for him; the odd sleep and eating schedules were wreaking havoc with her diabetes.

Reaching over to flick her computer off, she frowned at the sight of the flashing email indicator. Quickly she opened it and her eyes widened. Ivana re-read the message two times before the full implications finally sank into her over-tired brain. "Shit!" Quickly, she closed the program and hit the right sequence to secure her computer from interlopers then grabbed her purse and ran for the door.

As she found her car in the vast underground lot, fumbling with her keys in one hand and her cell phone in the other, the agent's mind raced through all of the facts she'd gathered for ten months. _Shit!_ She should have suspected something more sinister when his identifiers hadn't matched! _If I'm too late . . ._

Putting the phone to her ear, listening to the ringing coming from the other end, Ivana finally managed to get her car door opened. She slid into the seat, "C'mon, pick up, Joe." Over and over again, she repeated the words like a mantra. As the worried blonde fumbled her key into the ignition, she heard the tone that signaled pick-up.

"Hey, Joe? It's Ivana."

"Joe?" the feminine voice on the other side momentarily confused the agent.

_What the hell is a woman doing . . .? Never mind, too much information. Joe wants a woman over, it's a free country._ The next words, however, worried her even more.

"Oh, no. Joe's not here, he left for Miami last night. He's on hurricane rescue. I've sublet his apartment." The unknown woman paused for breath then went on, "I'm one of the New York temporary replacements, Lindsay Monroe. I could take a message, but I'm not sure when he'll get it." The woman with the mid-west accent seemed eager to help, despite the extremely early hour. "You can contact the Miami-Dade Police. That's where he was sent."

"Miami-Dade? Damn!" This just kept getting worse and worse. "Okay, do me a favor, Miss Monroe. This is Federal Agent Ivana Gideon. Joe is working an important case with me. There should be an Agent Fredericks, John Fredericks, showing up later today looking for Joe. Let him know I've got everything under control."

Lindsay laughed softly on the other side. "You missed him. He showed up here about an hour or two ago. He's either at the airport now or, if he got lucky, he found a plane to Miami already."

"Shit!"

"Excuse me?" Lindsay's tone became a little less friendly, a little more censored.

Ivana sighed, drawing in her anger. "Nothing. Thanks, Miss Monroe. I appreciate your help." Before the woman on the other side could think to say anything else, Ivana cancelled the call then dialed once more.

She never had approved of people talking on the phone while driving but this was an emergency. Taking a turn too quickly, swearing at the maneuvering she had to perform to keep the SUV on the road, Ivana impatiently waited for the airport to answer. When they did, she was already pulling into the Washington-Dulles airport. "This is Agent Gideon of the FBI. I need to get to Miami as quickly as possible."

Slamming her car to a stop in a long-term parking spot, Ivana grabbed her purse and headed for the terminal. She listened to the clerk's account about the hurricane warnings and the danger of flying down. When the man said they were only allowing hurricane rescue to fly down that morning, Ivana jumped on the excuse.

"Well, that's why I'm going!" She spotted the lone clerk, on the phone at his podium, and hurried over. Slamming her badge on the desk, displaying her credentials for him, she hung up and firmly stated, "I have a victim in the Federal Witness Protection Program who is stuck in the Miami area. I need to get him out of there to safety, but he has a heart condition and needs help . . . now! I need to be on the very next flight out." Leaning towards the man, who stared at her as if he had no idea what he should do, Ivana made sure her words were clear and precise. "If he dies, I will hold you personally responsible."

With that threat hanging over him, and no actual procedures in place for such a circumstance, the man made a quick decision. He started typing as quickly as he could, verifying and re-verifying her credentials as he did so. "I have a flight for volunteers going out in three hours, Ma'am. That's the earliest we have. It'll be landing in Orlando at approximately . . ."

"Fine, I'll take it," she cut him off, handing over her Federal credit card. Ivana felt no guilt at using her business expenses. She had been assigned Joe's safety, and that was exactly what she was going to Miami for: Joe's safety from a man who'd tried to kill him once and may well do so again.


	17. Prelude to the Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon
> 
> .

_"You're only my brother by default!" Dark eyes flashing what could only be called an unholy fire, the dark-haired boy waved a pair of lethal looking scissors through the air, unheeding that he'd come extremely close to the infant crying in the bassinet. "I was here first! You're just the after-birth!" The boy grinned maliciously and added, "Everyone thinks you're so perfect, but I'll show them perfect!" His scissors, now quite under control, came closer to the infant. "Just keep crying, Brat!"_

_"No!"_

Joe startled awake, looking around in dread as he felt the world shift and sway around him.

"Shit, Joe!" Aiden's voice brought him dazedly back to reality and he blinked at the sexy brunette. She tried to regain control of the Hummer. He'd apparently startled her pretty badly during his nightmare. Still pissed, Aiden's Brooklyn accent came out heavier than normal. "What the hell was that all about?"

"Sorry," he muttered, looking around again, "Nightmare."

With a snort Aiden regained the road and continued driving into the gale-force winds and rain; it had not been only Joe's scream that had sent her nearly off-road. The closer they got to the Miami area the worse the weather was. One could only imagine the pounding the Keys and Cuba were receiving from the hurricane.

Turning her head very briefly to check on him, Aiden looked back at the road. "Try to stay awake, then. I don't need that kind of shit when I'm driving through a hurricane."

Joe instantly recalled her annoyance at finding he didn't have a driver's license, but his mind snapped sharply back to the present when he suddenly realized they were actually entering Miami proper. The memories started flooding back. Doing a mental count, Joe realized with some surprise, and not too little dark humor, that it was a year to the day of the shooting that had changed his life.

xxx

"Dead, I can't . . . man, minding your own business, then, wham! Dead!"

Danny had been going on and on about the death toll of law enforcement, and how unfair it was, for the entire drive to Miami. Normally, after such a lengthy monologue, Mac would have been crawling the walls. This one he hdd let continue, though, as Danny needed to vent about the shock of losing yet another cop in the line of duty. Mac silently agreed that police work was too dangerous for normal people, which was why the police had such extensive training in self-defense and teamwork.

"Damn!"

Mac hadn't needed Danny's expletive to alert him to the swerving Hummer in front of them. He slammed on the brakes and jerked the wheel so he headed into the median, feeling the rougher terrain under their own vehicle. _What the hell's happening up there?_ Mac's first thought was that Aiden lost control in the weather, but a niggling worry that Joe had attacked her crept in. Too late he realized he should have been the one partnering Joe on this trip; he'd grown too used to having Aiden do it whenever she was available at the lab.

In the rearview mirror, Mac caught a sight of Stella calmly directing her own rental Hummer towards the shoulder, thus avoiding hitting Mac if he came to a stop.

After only a few minutes Mac realized Aiden had her vehicle under control, and he pulled back onto the interstate. Stella joined them a heartbeat later. The small caravan made its way into the Miami city limits. Mac kept as close an eye as he could on the lead Hummer while still fighting the storm. He didn't question how Aiden knew where the Crime Lab they had to report to was; apparently Joe was giving directions, lending credence to his claim that he'd lived down here.

The head of the New York City Crime Lab was more certain by the hour that he had Caine's supposedly dead CSI, Tim Speedle, working for him in a protected capacity. The main questions were: why was Speedle in protective custody, had he lied when he'd claimed he wasn't TJ Spedelli the Tanglewood Boy, and, if he was who he really claimed to be, why the close resemblance to a hood Danny was terrified of?

Hopefully the Miami-Dade Crime Lab would provide the answers he sought.

xxx

It had been a long morning, and promised to be an equally long afternoon, as the Miami team worked to not only finish prepping the lab for after-Hurricane duties, but also tried to continue their search for Speed's past. A week before, they had each been given assignments pertaining to that goal, and so far no one had anything to report worthwhile. Their regular duties kept them far too busy to do as much checking as they would have liked.

Fortunately the preparations were well under control and Horatio had just had a heads-up that he was receiving a few CSI's to help after the hurricane. Other areas were receiving the bulk of volunteers, but to have even the five he'd been assigned would help with any of the typical rescues and crimes that came with natural disasters. The help would free up his hard-worked team just enough to be able to get some rest, and possibly, after Hurricane Rita was off the radar, they might be able to get back to their investigation.

That time actually came sooner than Horatio had expected.

Striding into the layout room, the redhead moved towards the corner reserved specifically for their private investigation. Eric was already there, checking over the files with Calleigh. As they looked up, Horatio stopped to the right of them, smiling towards the pair with his head slightly cocked.

He didn't even have to prompt as Delko said "Nothing on the tattoo, H. No one recognized him and only one person recognized the tattoo, but he refused to say anything about it except that it was a New York special."

Calleigh opened her mouth to add her news but Ryan interrupted from the doorway, "Tanglewood is the name of a New York gang." The petite blonde closed her mouth, eyes widening as the dark-haired investigator moved to join them by the time line. Surprisingly Alexx Woods followed him in; no one challenged her.

Ryan pointed to the colored flag for Speed's missing teenaged summers. "His sixteenth birthday written on the tattoo doesn't have anything to do with the Tanglewood Jazz Festival. In 1989, that didn't start until June 30th, a week after his birthday." Ryan turned his dark eyes on the rest of the team. "But I did wonder if it had some significance in New York, instead, since that's where he went for the summers. During my search, I came across a gang called the Tanglewood Boys out of Staten Island; they do recruiting for the Mafia."

The news was not what they'd wanted to hear. No matter how much they searched, Stetler seemed to be able to link Speed with gun running, and with a Mafia gang tattoo as prime evidence, it looked like Horatio's team might have just lost the chance to clear their friend's name.

Alexx frowned. "Timmy wouldn't have been in a gang unless he were _Shanghaied_ ," she said firmly.

"Is it possible that Speedle was two different people?" Everyone looked at Ryan; Eric frowned. The younger man clarified, "We've had a couple of cases of split personalities, and people with split personalities are often unaware of their other halves."

Eric shook his head vehemently. "Speed was sane, Wolfe."

"As an investigator, he'd have to pass psychological tests to get on the team." Calleigh's voice was matter-of-fact. "If his personality split after he was already on the team then why a tattoo with his sixteenth birthday?"

Curiously Alexx asked, "Was Tim right-handed or left-handed?"

"Right-handed," came Delko's immediate response. With a little bit of thought, Calleigh and Horatio backed that statement up.

Alexx nodded. "I thought so."

She headed over to the autopsy photos and pulled up the ones displaying Speed's trunk and arms. "The body I did the autopsy on was left-handed." She turned to face them. "The musculature of his left arm was more developed, the bones a bit larger and the calluses on his fingers were that of a left-handed writer. I recorded the discrepancy in my notes since I'd thought he was right-handed."

"Well, that _is_ a puzzle." Horatio's soft voice drawled into the conversation at last. He looked over the pictures, the time line, and the notes they had posted. "What about the appendectomy, Alexx? Did we find anything else about that?"

"Nothing, Horatio," the woman sighed and ran a hand through her hair, looking over the related picture. "I even broke down and asked his mother if he'd had surgery. She swore he'd never had one, had been in perfect health."

Calleigh jumped in finally. "His brother, Thomas, had an appendectomy."

All eyes turned to the blonde woman and she gestured to the record in front of her. "I remembered that Tim mentioned a brother, so I thought I'd check to see how he was doing. I called his mother, too," she glanced at Alexx, "she must've been shocked by all of the sudden interest in her sons." With a blue marking pen, she started writing on the time line. "She told me his brother, Matthew, was born thirteen years after Tim, and that he was living in Syracuse in perfect health. I got a hold of him to verify, and she was right."

"Speedle's record only lists a Matthew, but not a Thomas. Who's the Thomas with the appendectomy?" Ryan pulled the unattended record over to follow along with Calleigh's biographical explanation.

"He died." She turned her blue eyes on the waiting team then turned back to the time line on the lit wall. "Tim never mentioned him, even in his files, and his parents didn't say anything about him either. However, when I called Matthew, he said, and I quote, _'It's a shame Tim's dead. He was always the nice one.'_ I asked what he meant and he told me that Speed was a twin, second born, and the older twin was named Thomas. He'd died in New York City when they were seventeen. Speed and his parents never talked about him after Speed came home that summer and told them his brother had died." She looked back away from the time line at her friends. "Matthew didn't know how he died, though."

"A twin?" Alexx was shocked. Tim had never said anything to her, never said anything about a brother dying at all. In all those years she'd known the man she'd never truly known the inner depths, had she? Brown eyes closing in refreshed grief at the loss, at the missed chance to possibly help Tim with a loss he sounded like he'd been denying for a long time, Alexx sank back against the layout table.

Horatio thought carefully, absently twirling the stems of his sunglasses in his fingers. Finally, he asked, "What else did Matthew say about Thomas Speedle?"

The ringing of his cell phone cut shrilly though the air.

xxx

"Pick up, Horatio." Yelina Salas held her cell phone in one hand and the innocent-looking piece of notebook paper in her other. She could hear Ray Jr. running around the house, as requested, checking for his younger cousin, HR. Horatio had asked Yelina to take his son with them when they evacuated as he had to work, and the Columbian-American had been more than happy to take the well-behaved redhead.

Now she was wishing she'd demanded Horatio had taken the day off to tend to his own child.

Finally, she heard the signal that Horatio's phone had been answered. "Horatio?" the woman watched as her son came barreling down the steps, something she would normally have protested. At his breathless, "He's not upstairs, Mom," she nodded and said crisply, "Horatio, your son has run away."

xxx

"What?" blue eyes widened in shock at the news about his normally well-behaved ten-year-old. "Do you know where he went?" He kept his voice as calm as possible, holding up a hand to stop the talk about Speed. The others fell respectfully silent, not asking why he didn't just leave the lab to talk on the phone. It sounded like Horatio had a crisis on his hands.

"Okay," he slowly drawled out the word, instinctively giving himself a couple of extra seconds to absorb the information. "So, his note says he's coming to the lab. Did it say why?"

His eyes narrowed and his voice grew even softer. "I don't need rescuing." Naturally he didn't expect Yelina to respond to his comment, but respond she did and quite vocally, too. After a moment Horatio cut her off. "When did he leave?"

Quickly, Horatio pulled over a notepad and scribbled on it, _'HR coming here on bike. Left hour ago. Need find him.'_ He pushed the note towards his staff. They read it and rushed out, calling the names of different routes they'd take, Alexx claiming that she'd wait at the lab in case he got past everyone's look out. It looked like hurricane rescue efforts were beginning before the storm even ended.

"The lab has bomb-proof windows, Yelina, it should be safe for you both here. You can come here with Ray Jr. The team went out to find HR."

xxx

With an exasperated sound, Yelina bit out, "Right. We'll be down as soon as we can. I'll call you if I spot him on the way." After only a minimal pause, however, the irate, worried woman shot one last remark at her brother-in-law. "Your son just endangered several people, Horatio. I think you'd teach him better than that." It had been a callous comment, and later she would regret it. For the moment, the woman merely ordered her teenager into the car; they headed to the lab instead of evacuating.

xxx

"Damn him!" Margaret Wilson-Caine slammed her hand against the door to her ex-husband's condo and turned back into the wind and rain. She was livid. It had taken her hours to drive down from Orlando the night before, and she'd had trouble even getting a rental. The evacuation orders for Miami-Dade and Brower counties had spooked everyone, and she'd been getting stonewalled everywhere she turned. She really hated Miami.

Pushing long, wet black hair from her grey eyes, the reporter looked over the parking lot of the condominium complex. She didn't spot anything remotely like Horatio's taste in vehicles, confirming that the man wasn't just ignoring her knocks; he was out. Wet, cold, and tired, Margaret headed down the stairs and slid into the too-tiny compact she'd finally managed to rent from a reluctant clerk.

_I'll kill the bastard!_

It hadn't been the best of news when she'd been told to leave Iraq. Covering the war on terrorism has been a choice assignment, and suddenly she'd been pulled. Her presence disturbed the local women, she'd been told, but she knew it was the other reporters on the team who were disturbed. She was a better reporter than the lot of them, and they knew it. She had been offered a transfer to California as a consolation; she'd snapped it up eagerly. She had always despised Miami and was never happy that Horatio had moved them down there from New York in the first place.

Heading home into a hurricane had been even worse news. She hated wind and rain, and Miami always seemed to have more than its fair share of both during the hurricane season which to Peg seemed to last forever. She swore she'd get her son and just get out of there as quickly as possible.

Neither Horatio nor Junior was home. That final straw threatened to throw Peg into a rage, but she'd always had a steady temper in the face of obstacles . . . or so she imagined. _I'll track the bum down to the lab and give him what for._ She had told the man that she hadn't wanted their son's head filled with cop stories and false glory. _I should've known he'd take the very first opportunity to drag Junior from school and into that god-forsaken lab of his._

Peg wondered if she could get him charged with endangering the welfare of a child.

The woman drove towards the laboratory, trying to see in the whipping rain and branches. Signs shook violently and broken tree branches littered the water-drowned streets. Not a soul was in site except a stupid kid with an oversized raincoat and hat, trying to peddle against the wind. Idiot parents for letting their kid out in this kind of weather. She told herself that if she hadn't been on the way to get her own kid, she'd have picked the child up and taken him somewhere safe. She ignored the plight of the sorry child on the bicycle and drove right by.


	18. The Return

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon
> 
> .

"Whoa, pull over Aiden."

With a frown, the native New Yorker scanned the road before her, trying to figure out what had bothered Joe. It couldn't be the red compact; her partner looked towards the sidewalk not the driver with the very inappropriate vehicle. As Aiden drove slowly due to the low visibility from the weather, it wasn't too long before she noticed the kid with the bicycle. They were past him in a couple of seconds, but Aiden quickly pulled over. "What the hell is a kid doing out in this?" She glanced over her shoulder towards the sodden figure.

"I don't know, but we need to help him." Joe turned a weather-wise eye on the horizon. "This can only get worse." He glanced back at the kid, unfastening his belt, "And we haven't even had landfall yet."

Nodding Aiden also unfastened her belt, noticing that Mac and Stella had pulled their Hummers over as well. "Let's bring him to that lab, Joe. We can probably use the computers to find out where he's _supposed_ to be."

The pair slid from their Hummer, fighting the blinding rain and wind. Joe made it to the child first. As she approached, Aiden watched as the child seemed to instantly respond to Joe. She hung back, letting the tall man deal with the kid; it would be less terrifying than _two_ strangers. The kid seemed to ask Joe for proof of identification because the man whipped out his lab credentials and showed them to the kid.

With a nod, the small figure in the over-sized rain gear looked towards the last Hummer, Stella's, when Joe pointed towards it. Joe said something, but the wind caught the sound and Aiden couldn't understand. With an enthusiastic nod the child hurried towards Stella's Hummer; Joe easily lifted the bike to settle onto the unused luggage rack on top of the Hummer. He reached into the Hummer for some of their rope and quickly tied down the frame of the bicycle.

xxx

Stella watched in surprise as Joe spoke to the unknown child, showed his identification, then pointed back at her. It took only seconds to realize that their newest team member had decided that the child needed rescuing. Only a couple of seconds more passed before Stella understood that Joe had told the child to climb in with her.

The woman greeted the soaked child with a wide smile. Once he was settled in the passenger seat, the back was loaded with luggage and equipment so room was a minor problem, Stella nodded and pulled back out behind Mac and Aiden. She glanced over as the boy removed a too-large rain hat, revealing soaked red hair and merry blue eyes. He reminded her of Lieutenant Caine, though she'd only met the man once.

"I'm Stella. What's your name?" Stella purposely kept her voice light and friendly.

"HR," the redhead grinned then glanced out the window eagerly. "I'm on my way to the Crime Lab; my dad's a science investigator. He's the best there is" the boy bragged, obviously proud of his father.

Laughing Stella said, "I'm a science investigator, too. We're on our way to the lab to help with the hurricane."

Mischief danced in the blue eyes HR turned on the woman, and she wondered just what the boy was up to. "How?"

"How?" She kept her eyes on the road.

"Yeah, how are you going to help the hurricane? I think it's got things pretty much under control right now." A second laughed before Stella and HR laughed heartily at his silliness.

As the drive continued, HR told Stella several stories about the families he'd lived with and the wild things he'd seen. Even taking into consideration that half of what he said could just be lies or fantasies, he'd apparently led a very busy life. The boy also had apparently had no stable existence for his first nine years. Stella, being a 'system kid' herself, thought she could detect one behind the laughter and excited chatter. The boy seemed so lonely, so eager to please . . . and the multitude of names and places were another dead give-away that he'd been shunted from home to home through the years.

All of his stories, however, were laced with comments about how fun it was to live with his father and what a great man his father was and other such telling comments. Whatever had happened to cause HR to lead a gypsy life before had apparently changed. Stella would bet the child lived with his father now; she hoped that whatever had caused the man to give up his son in the first place had been taken care of. A drunk or abusive father who'd apparently changed could easily slip back into old coping habits, and that would be very dangerous for the poor, lonely child.

Stella made a mental vow that she would make sure the man was worth returning the kid to. If not she'd find a way to use the boy's hurricane plight against the unknown man. She hated child abusers.

xxx

When they arrived at the lab, Joe directed Aiden around the side to the back. She gave him a confused look, but he shook his head. "We don't have the right ID to get in the front doors, and the guards won't be there to let us in. The morgue should be unlocked, though."

"You used to work down here, Joe?" Aiden's asked, curious but not suspicious. She knew she'd been doing baby-sitting duties on the new tech but trusted Mac and hadn't questioned the reasoning; most likely Joe's security clearance hadn't processed yet. She'd heard of one case that had taken thirteen months to clear and the person hadn't had any criminal record or even a traffic ticket. It was military service that had tied _that_ person up; maybe it was the same for Joe.

Joe's dark eyes saddened when he turned them to his companion and she gave him a sympathetic smile. "Yeah, I used to work here."

"Morgue?"

With a shake of his head, Joe pointed towards the turn-off to the morgue. "CSI. I was shot during a case."

Aiden looked thoughtfully at the man then turned her attention towards steering into the parking area at the back of the lab. There were several parking spots back there but only one had a vehicle in it: a dark colored truck with the crime lab logo proudly displayed. As the pair waited for Mac and Stella to finish their maneuvering, Aiden turned her full attention on Joe and asked, "So, what made you decide to come to New York and become a tech?" She thought that, perhaps, after being shot Joe may have lost his nerve for working in the field.

Looking her straight in the eyes, his own dark eyes serious, intent, Joe said, "I have no idea. I'm in Witness Protection, but they won't tell me what H and I stumbled across."

Something clicked. "My god, you're Miami's dead CSI?" Aiden's dark eyes widened in sudden realization.

"Yeah," Joe opened the door and stepped into the howling storm. He leaned inside and confirmed, "I'm Tim Speedle. Let's go."

xxx

The group of five adults and one child made their way to the double doors normally used to admit bodies on stretchers. The doors were unlocked, as predicted, and the drenched group filed in, grateful to be out of the storm. As they started removing wet jackets, trying to get rid of the chill that was settling in, a noise alerted them that they were not alone.

xxx

It felt odd to have the entire lab to herself. Normally Alexx didn't even venture upstairs, the morgue being her domain. When she pulled a late shift or an odd rotation the medical examiner was far too busy with her patients to wander about in the nearly empty rooms and laboratories. During her regular shift the place was a hive of activity, and it was all anyone could do to find a quiet area let alone an empty one. Now, with the investigators out looking for Horatio's son and most of the lab staff evacuated until after the hurricane, the Miami-Dade Crime Lab was empty and echoingly silent.

Feeling it was the perfect time to finish her checks on the morgue, despite having completely readied it before joining the impromptu meeting, Alexx headed confidently downstairs, skipping the elevator this time. She wasn't afraid of silence or the vast, empty halls so the clicking of her heels on the linoleum floor was more of a background white noise than something she consciously noticed.

What she did notice was the echoing of the morgue's double doors shutting.

There were very few people who knew that she would be there that day and so there were very few people who would know those doors were unlocked during this evacuation. They were never left open without authorized coroner staff available; that would have compromised the integrity of the lab and jeopardized any evidence stored on-site. Even her car wasn't outside; her husband's car was in the shop so she'd driven her assigned crime lab truck to work in order to let her husband evacuate the kids. Thus the only people who knew those doors would be unlocked were the investigators and her fellow medical examiners.

Alexx took a deep breath to steady her suddenly heightened nerves. She knew the sound of her movements would alert the intruder but that meant she might scare him off, too. Moving swiftly and allowing herself to make the normal sounds of any other day, the exotic looking doctor with the tip-tilted dark eyes headed directly for her office. She never carried a weapon, but she didn't plan to be without her mace, just in case.

As she approached, she realized that the intruder was actually between her and the office, moving about in the hallway. It took only a matter of seconds to realize that it wasn't only one intruder, either; there were half a dozen; she could see shadows playing across the wall, coming from a light one of them must have turned on. She could not take on a half dozen people. Her best choice was to get upstairs and call for back-up before confronting the intruders. Before she knew what happened, though, the sound of running feet on the floor, followed by a woman's voice, broke the near stillness.

"Hey! Get back here, kid!"

HR pelted up to Alexx, a huge grin on his face, followed closely by a brunette Alexx had never seen before. The sounds of the others joining the chase sounded down the hall. Slipping her arms protectively around the red-haired ten-year-old, Alexx slid him behind her and stood straight, looking the brunette in the eyes.

"You've found our wayward boy. Thank you." Her voice held a strict challenge, though Alexx didn't come right out and tell the woman to leave. She couldn't kick someone out into the hurricane without proof of a genuine threat. As the dark-haired, sleepy-eyed woman stopped before her, Alexx gestured towards the elevator. "Let me show you to a place you can wait out the storm."

"Doctor Woods, I came to help Dad." Alexx looked down into HR's eager face and frowned. His smile faltered.

Sinking to one knee, she said, her voice firm, "You scared the daylights out of us, HR. Your father took the others out to look for you. He's worried sick."

The rest of the group made it to the trio, but Alexx ignored them right then, trusting that they were not a threat since they hadn't hurt Horatio's son. She hugged the boy fiercely and gave him a stern look. "You were supposed to evacuate with your Aunt. She's worried, too, HR."

Hanging his head, at last realizing what he'd done hadn't been brave so much as stupid, the boy shuffled one foot around the wet linoleum. "I'm sorry, Doctor Woods. I . . ." he looked up, tears in his big blue eyes, "I wanted to protect Dad. He's always helping everyone and no one looks out for him."

Alexx hugged the boy tightly and shook her head. "You're wrong, HR. We all look out for your father." Suddenly, it sunk in that the boy and his rescuers were soaking wet. The medical examiner looked at the group with a small frown. "We should get you dry . . ." As she stood she reached for HR's hand saying, "I'll need to call Horatio and let him know you're safe."

With barely a glance for the team of rescuers, too intent on the tasks at hand, Alexx led the group into the elevator. No one said a word but Alexx knew that as soon as she got them settled there would be plenty of talking to do. Pushing the button for the floor the locker rooms were on, Alexx pulled out her phone and speed-dialed Horatio's number. She had her back to the group, keeping HR's hand firmly in hers, as she informed his father of the child's rescue.

Tthe elevator doors opened. She smiled, clicked her phone shut and led the small group out of the elevators and down the hall. She hadn't yet gotten a good look at the group, but she was aware that it contained two women and three men, all soaked to the skin. She stopped first at the men's locker room and turned, opening her mouth to tell them where things should be stored inside. The tallest of the lot, dark curls dripping around his head, stepped forward and stopped her before she began.

"Hey, Alexx."

"Tim . . . Timmy?" Alexx hesitated only a moment as the memory of a death and autopsy flashed through her mind. She quickly pushed aside the thoughts, however, as she threw herself at the tall man, tears streaming down her face. "Baby, you're back!"

Speed slipped his arms tightly around Alexx, burying his face into her neck and just holding his closest friend as they both cried.

xxx

After a few emotionally charged minutes, Mac cleared his throat and softly said, "Joe? Care to introduce us?"

"Joe?" The dark-skinned woman sounded confused as she pulled away from the taller man.

Looking down at Alexx for a long moment, Speed finally let go and turned to his new team. "This is Doctor Alexx Woods; she's the medical examiner here." He didn't care if he made it sound like she worked the morgue by herself; as far as he was concerned, she did. Gesturing to each in turn, he introduced the New York group to the coroner. "That's Mac Taylor, Stella Bonasera, Aiden Burn, and Danny Messer. They're the investigators for New York." Again, he didn't care if his words made it sound like his new team was composed of the only investigators the crime lab employed.

Alexx touched Speed's cheek, worry lacing her voice. "Where have you been, Baby? I . . . I did your autopsy . . ." Confusion joined the worry.

Tim explained with a frustrated sigh, "I've been in Witness Protection but they haven't told me why. What the hell did we stumble onto, Alexx? Was H hurt?" Finally, after a year of trying to survive, Speed allowed himself the luxury of self-anger over not cleaning his gun: it was Hollis last time, this time could easily have been Horatio. As it was Calleigh's prediction that he would be the next victim had come eerily true.

"Horatio's fine, Baby, it's you I'm worried about. You're soaked to the bone." Speed listened bemusedly as Alexx turned to the others and instructed them on the locker room layout. She turned her face back up to Speed, giving him another quick hug, "It hasn't changed in the past year. You can show the guys around. They can change into jumpers or scrubs."

His heart filled with contentment when she cupped his cheek and stared into his eyes. "You get cleaned up and we'll talk after. There's a lot that's happened." Alexx kissed his other cheek and pulled back slightly but Speed still had to untangle himself from her. It seemed that now he was back, neither friend wanted to be out of the other's presence.

Speed knew it would be like that with each of his friends; they were his family . . . closer to him than even his mother.


	19. Reunions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon

Letting the hot water cascade over his tired, cold body, Danny felt the nervousness start up again. It was rare he was with Joe . . . uh . . . Tim; he wasn't too comfortable with the other man. Add to the mix the fact that Tim reminded him of Spedelli and it was enough to make his skin crawl. Danny shuddered and warily looked over at the darker man.

He was surprised by what he saw.

Tim's back was to him, the scars from his wound very evident against his pale skin. Even more evident was the lack of the _Tanglewood_ tattoo Danny had so dreaded seeing. There was no indication the man had even had a tattoo either: no marks, scars, or anything confirming removal by acid or other means. Stunned, unaware he was staring, Danny tried to wrap his head around the idea that he'd mistaken their tech for an old adversary; Joe, or Tim, or whatever he wanted to be called today, was _not_ TJ Spedelli.

"Need something?"

Tim's calm voice broke through Danny's surprise and the blond detective came back to his senses, flushing at how his staring might be construed. With nonchalance he found hard to display, the New Yorker shrugged and gestured with a careless hand towards the other man's scars, also visible on his chest. "Went right through the heart?"

Looking down, as if vaguely interested, the man glanced back up and nodded. "Yeah, through-and-through, actually. Guess I'm lucky to be alive at all."

Mac's voice joined from Danny's other side. "You're Tim Speedle."

Danny felt his shoulders jerk and wondered why Mac would think . . . then his quick mind added the few facts he knew with the many missing pieces and he realized that his boss was probably right. Somehow, New York City's crime lab had wound up with a CSI from Miami; someone in the Witness Program had screwed up big time.

"Yeah."

Staying quiet, Danny watched as Mac turned off his showerhead and grabbed a towel, moving closer to the man they'd known as Joe Avery for the past nine months. Absently, Danny noted Mac's chest scarring from his time in Beirut. Somehow he felt a little awkward without any marks on his own torso: as if he'd failed to prove himself somehow. The blond shook off the negative feeling and turned his own shower off, grabbing one of the standard locker room towels that sat nearby.

Tim Speedle did the same.

Stopping in front of Tim, Mac waited for the man to wrap the cloth around his waist before asking, "So, who is TJ Spedelli? You said you knew him."

Intense fear struck with that name and Danny fought for control. He knew Tim couldn't be a Tanglewood Boy, but the dark, intense man apparently had connections, too . . . just like Danny did. Had Tim recognized Danny, just as the blonde had thought he'd recognized the raven-haired man? Taking a series of deep breaths to maintain calm, Danny waited for the answer, his eyes remaining steady on the trace expert.

xxx

Speed shook his head at the curiosity he saw in Mac's and Danny's expressions, ignoring the fear he also saw in Danny. He headed towards the benches and the folded CSI jumpers there. In a steady voice Speed answered, "He was my brother. I'll explain when we're all together, Mac. It'll be easier than repeating it several times." He turned dark eyes on his current supervisor. "I have a feeling he was the one they were supposed to be putting in protective custody . . . and if that's true, someone lied about his death a long time ago."

As he passed the blond investigator, Speed noticed Danny stiffen. "You must've known Tom . . . TJ," was his only comment. He stopped by the bench and grabbed the clothing up. Glancing over his shoulder, Speed couldn't help notice that the stiff set of Danny's shoulders hadn't lessened one bit.

It looked like it would take a bit of convincing to prove he wasn't as bad as his brother had been. Speed did _not_ relish the task; he'd been cleaning up his brother's messes his entire childhood and escaping his brother's cruelty during adolescence. It looked like his older brother hadn't finished blackening either of their names even after being reported dead fifteen years ago.

With a sigh, Speed headed towards the banks of lockers to get dressed.

xxx

Quietly washing and rinsing, HR stayed out of the adult conversation. His mother had never appreciated his interruptions, even if they were good questions, so he'd learned long ago to keep his questions to himself. Except with Dad; _he_ seemed to like questions. But these men weren't Dad, and HR had no idea if they even liked kids let alone questions.

They kept talking about somebody named TJ, which struck HR as interesting since he was going by his initials, too. The tones, however, made him feel like that TJ guy wasn't very nice. He sure hoped he didn't have to meet him.

Being a naturally curious ten-year-old, the boy took this rare opportunity to inspect the men, comparing his self to their much larger forms. With some surprise, he noted that there was little difference, except hair and scars; only one even had a tattoo which seemed to be a common fixture of adult males in cop shows.

Trying to maneuver around to get a good look at the blonde's arm, and thus the intricate tattoo he wore, HR froze when he noticed the really tall guy moving towards him. It was the man he'd talked to outside, the one who'd said he could come to the crime lab before HR even got to tell him that his father runs the crime lab. With a wide-eyed stare, the boy noticed the scars over the heart area and wondered if he'd been shot; a lot of cops got shot.

When the man moved right by him, the boy swung around and continued watching, seeing the scars on his back. What had he said when the blond man asked? _A through-and-through . . . What did that mean? He'd have to ask Dad; it sounded dangerous. Maybe_ , HR's quick mind worked the problem, _it means he's been shot and the bullet went all the way through his body?_

The movement of the last two men interrupted his thoughts, and HR quickly finished rinsing, not wanting to be left in that shower room alone. It was kind of creepy, being so quiet with that weird echo.

Right on the blonde's heels, pretty much, HR grabbed his own smaller-sized jumpsuit and followed the men to the lockers to get dressed. It was too large and the boy suspected it had been made for a woman, even if the embroidery on the front spelled the word _'Duquesne,'_ whatever that meant.

xxx

With a soft growl the dark-haired woman unfolded herself from the tiny rental car and hurried over to the unsheltered glass doors of the crime lab. She tried to pull them open then, ignoring the blatant sign in case someone had messed up, she pushed for good measure. Cupping a hand against her face, Margaret Wilson-Caine tried to glimpse inside the normally light, airy building, but it seemed rather forbidding and empty. Had Horatio actually evacuated with Junior after all?

Rain lashed the woman, sending shivers convulsing through her thinly clad body. A business suit really wasn't appropriate for a hurricane, and she began to hate Miami all over again. When a tree limb slid over the water-logged road behind her, the reporter nearly screamed.

 _This is getting ridiculous!_ It seemed like she'd been chasing after Horatio all day. _The least he could have done was leave a note on his door explaining what shelter he'd gone to._ Giving the door one last hard smack for good measure, the woman trudged back to the hated rental car and slumped inside, forehead pressed to the steering wheel as she tried to figure out where to look next.

She was bound and determined to get out of there as soon as possible, and that meant having to pick up Junior from wherever his father was keeping him. It never struck her that she should leave her son in his father's capable hands; Horatio Jr. was hers, and Margaret Wilson-Caine didn't like to share.

The sound of several vehicles pulling up brought the woman's attention from her internal musings. She glanced over and instantly recognized the crime lab Hummers assigned to the investigative staff. Watching, she saw two . . . three . . . four people getting out of their separate vehicles. She recognized Horatio as one of them.

With a fierce growl, she yanked open her door and slipped getting out, falling to the pavement. Swearing profusely she tried to stand and found herself unable in the tight, water-logged suit skirt. She added the pain and humiliation to Horatio's growing list of crimes. When she felt someone next to her, squatting down and reaching to carefully grasp her elbow, she growled louder and yanked away, slamming her arm against the side of the rental car.

Peg yelped and lashed out at the dark-haired Latino man trying to grab for her, ignoring his "Hey, calm down. I'm trying to help you." Her well-manicured nails raked the man's handsome face and he swore as he pulled back, hand going instantly to the bleeding welts she caused.

A sudden yank on her other arm had her on her feet and well out of attacking distance.

xxx

Anger welled in Horatio when he saw Peg scratch Eric's face. The lab supervisor strode over in two long strides and yanked his ex-wife up by her free arm, absently uncaring if he'd managed to hurt the woman. Since she didn't cry out, he doubted she'd been injured by him; she would have screamed bloody murder if she had. "Delko, get inside and get that tended. Document it, in case it becomes trouble."

"Sure," Peg's tone was venomous, "worry about your little cop friend but don't even ask me if I'm hurt. In case you're blind as well as deaf, 'Ratio, I'm the one who fell." She didn't yank her arm from her ex-husband's grip, however, believing that if she over-balanced, he'd probably let her fall.

Horatio's blue eyes snapped fire as he calmly, softly stated, "Don't ever attack another member of my staff, Peg, or I'll press charges." Without another word he pulled the dark-haired woman to the lab door, sliding his ID through the reader and pulling her inside.

She did not resist.

Once inside, Horatio let go of his ex-wife as if burned. He watched her stagger, prepared to catch her before she hit the hard floor, but thankfully when she found her balance and remained standing. Vaguely the lab supervisor noticed Delko heading towards a first aid station, while Ryan unlocked the front door, and Calleigh stood by to help if she was needed. Horatio slipped his hands onto his hips, still watching Peg angrily.

With a sigh Horatio suddenly let the anger go; it wasn't worth it to get into one of their legendary arguments right in the lab. Peg wouldn't listen anyway, and he'd just look bad in front of his team. The redhead gestured towards his office, watching Peg carefully. "Let's go talk, Peg."

She opened her mouth to say something but the sound of the door opening drew her attention.

Horatio glanced over his shoulder and gave a tired smile to his sister-in-law and nephew. Neither Yelina nor Ray Jr. looked too pleased, and the man knew he'd have to find a way to appease his family. But first he had to deal with Peg. Turning back to her, he gestured again towards his office, "Peg . . ." It wasn't a request; it was a veiled order. By the narrowing of Peg's grey eyes, she recognized it as such.

Peg moved off towards the stairs not even limping, Horatio noticed. Apparently her worst injury was the arm she'd slammed into her car. He'd have to see that taken care off. When Yelina signaled Ray Jr. to wait in the lobby then followed the pair, no one protested. Horatio figured Peg thought the woman would take her side as a matter of feminine principles, while Horatio preferred not to be alone with the woman who had once been his wife. If Yelina wanted to insinuate herself in the middle of what promised to be a very unpleasant interview, Horatio wasn't about to stop her. He appreciated the backup, even if he didn't say it.

Fortunately, he didn't have to worry about his wayward son: Alexx had called to say she had him with her. That was why he'd called his own staff back, as well as Yelina. He wanted them to be able to relax a little knowing the boy was safe. Horatio would have to see to his son as soon as he got rid of Peg. He knew Yelina wouldn't mind waiting even if she chose to follow him around until he was free; his sister-in-law was a patient woman.

xxx

Once inside the supervisor's office, Peg's eyes roamed the room she had never seen before. When she'd divorced Horatio, he'd been on the bomb squad. After the divorce, she never visited her ex-husband so wasn't even fully sure of just what he did to supervise a criminal science lab. She figured he told the others what cases to research and helped them figure out where to look for their evidence when they got stuck. Supervisors in most occupations rarely went into the field.

The office was glass-lined, giving a clear view of the labs below. It was neat, clean, and had very few personal touches to denote the man who worked there. Only a few pictures, displayed on the side of his desk, and a childish drawing on one of the cabinets, showed that a person actually used the place. Curiously, Peg drew closer to study the drawing and pictures. What she saw sent her anger flaring once again.

"Who the hell is this?" Peg reached out and snatched the picture off of the desk. The photograph was of a small girl with bright red hair and a pretty, shy smile. There was no denying the resemblance to Horatio, and Peg, who knew he wasn't married, was livid that he'd display a picture of his bastard right next to her son's photo.

His attitude was calm, collected, as he glanced at the picture and softly said, "That is Madison, my . . ."

But Peg cut him off, whirling around and glaring at him. "You had the judge convinced you were a saint. I told him bomb squads can't possibly work at all hours of the night, all week long. But somehow you managed to get him to side with you and claim that fidelity wasn't the issue. I had to tell him that I didn't want to be married to a cop to get the divorce!" Peg slapped the photo face down on the desk and pointed a trembling finger at the taller man. "You convinced the entire world you were this pure, innocent man who was misjudged by his wife, and here I see the evidence! You were sleeping around, 'Ratio, and I think that's disgusting!"

xxx

Anger sparked again in the redhead's eyes, but this time he managed to keep his cool. With one swift stride, he stepped next to his ex-wife and reached out. She flinched, surprising him; he'd never struck her in the entire time they'd known each other. _Who hit her? Who scared her so much?_ Horatio ruthlessly pushed back the wayward thoughts and finished reaching for Madison's picture, running a gentle finger over the pretty features of the girl.

"First of all, Peg, Madison is only five. Since we've been divorced over ten years that would mean I couldn't possibly be cheating on you to produce Madison. We were no longer married when she was conceived." He carefully placed the picture down and turned to Peg, catching just a glimpse of Yelina standing silently in the doorway.

Slipping his hands to his hips, Horatio added, "Second, Peg, I never cheated on you. You admitted yourself that you made up the infidelity charges to get a divorce. You lied and you paid."

"And third," Horatio knew admitting Raymond was the girl's father would hurt Yelina, and he wanted to protect his sister-in-law. Hurting her to get a point on Peg was not the way to do that. So he changed what he'd been about to say. "Third, I am as proud to claim Madison as I am HR. She's a special girl. If you can't say anything nice about her, leave my lab." After a small pause, watching Peg try to form words to throw at him, he added even more softly, "On second thought, don't even mention Madison again, Peg. You don't have the right to judge her or the circumstances that brought her into the world."

Yelina's gentle touch on his shoulder showed Horatio that his sister-in-law would support him in this. He was silently thankful for her display. Family was one of the most important things to the criminalist; Peg's lies and divorce had been bitter indeed.

"Now, Peg, why are you here?" Horatio looked at the dripping wet woman. "You are supposed to be in Iraq, aren't you? Or," he couldn't resist the barb, "were you shooting safari in Africa?"

The woman straightened her shoulders and sent a glare up to the tall redhead. Crossing her arms over her bosom, she declared, "I've been reassigned to California. I want to get moving right away. Where's Junior?"

"HR."

She blinked at his calm tone, and Horatio let a small smile play across his face. At her confused, "what?" he responded, "Our son likes to be called HR."

Peg shook her head then had to push the wet strands of her hair from her eyes. She shot him an annoyed glare. "That's a stupid nickname. I didn't give him your name because I thought it would be cute to have him go by your stupid habit of using initials for a name. I . . ." With a frustrated grunt she apparently decided that nicknames were foolish to argue about. "I want my son, 'Ratio."

"I told you when you left him with me that I would fight in court to keep him, Peg." His tone stayed deceptively calm, and it served to force Peg to backtrack.

Doing an apparent reversal, the woman looked around and snapped out, "So, where is he? Did you send him to some shelter by himself? That's low, 'Ratio; he's just a little kid."

Tilting his head, moving so that he faced the lab below more than his ex-wife, Horatio said "He's here with Alexx."

"You bastard!" Peg slammed her hand on the desk but no one seemed surprised; Yelina had known the woman way back when and was pretty immune to her odd outbursts, as was Horatio. "I told you I didn't want him involved with law enforcement. You turn around, defying my wishes for my son, and fill his head with adventurous stories about the glory of police work. He's going to think that it's all fun and excitement and get himself shot like your brother did!"

That last comment had been hitting below the belt, and Horatio drew himself up even as Yelina flinched. Blue eyes narrowed dangerously as Horatio stepped closer to his ex-wife. "Your wishes don't mean anything, Peg. You gave up that right when you dumped him on me just before Christmas. If my son wants to be a cop, I'll damn well let him be."

"You'll get him killed like your brother," Peg's voice turned just as deadly.

"Don't go there." It was a definite warning.

The sound of Calleigh calling up the steps interrupted the pair. "Hey, Horatio, maybe y'all should get dried off."

"Another one of your sluts, 'Ratio?" Peg had never known when to back down.

Horatio merely looked the woman straight in the eyes. "A lady, Peg, something you wouldn't know anything about." He strode over to Yelina and opened the door for her, gesturing that she should precede him out of the office. At the crashing sound of a photo frame breaking behind him, he calmly stated, "If you damage one more thing in that office, Peg, I'll charge you with destruction of property and vandalism. Get downstairs and get dried off. I don't need you getting sick and throwing a tantrum while I'm trying to work."

The siblings-in-law left the room and the swearing woman behind.


	20. Endings and Beginnings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon

Curiosity drew Speed across the layout room to the chart, photos, and other evidence in the back corner. He looked at his entire life, and supposed death, spread out on the table and tacked up on the lighted wall. It was eerie in a way, but somehow comforting, to know that Horatio and the others would put so much effort into checking his death even after a year.

He ignored the sounds of others entering the lab as he leaned closer to the time line and read Calleigh's neat printing next to the even neater writing in a hand he didn't recognize. There were a couple of sticky flags marking his teenaged summers, and Speed knew it was because they hadn't been able to find out what he'd been doing in those months. With a bitter smile, he wondered what their reaction would be when they found out he'd spent all that time trying to hunt down his wayward brother and bring him back home.

Not once did Speed doubt the Miami team would hear the entire story. He had kept his brother's existence a secret for almost fifteen years, out of respect for his parents' wishes, but it looked like that secret may have landed him in this fix. According to what was in the corner of the lab, it may have jeopardized his career, too. Once and for all, he would lay his brother to rest and separate their lives permanently.

When he'd been thirteen, Speed had stopped Tom from trying to hurt baby Matthew. It had been a bitter argument, ending with Tom running away from home and Tim following to try to make things right with his twin. He'd always believed that they had to get along since they were two halves of a whole, had always believed that out of all identical twins, mirror twins should be the closest despite being opposites in everything, even their handedness. For five summers, Tim Speedle had put his life on hold and gone to Staten Island to find his brother, Tom, or TJ as he'd taken to calling himself, and try to bring him back no matter whatever he'd done wrong.

Speed was done with the secrets, the protection, the delusion . . . and with Tom.

"Timmy?"

Glancing over his shoulder, Speed nodded to Alexx, noticing Mac and the other New York CSI's had entered the room while he was occupied. With a negligent wave of his hand, the brunet turned back to the evidence display. "You want answers? Looks like H got them together for you." He waited as the small group moved forward, glancing briefly at the red-haired kid in their midst. Almost casually, he reached up and started taking down the autopsy photos, finishing just as the group came to a halt.

"Here," he handed the photos to Danny. "That's TJ Spedelli or, as I knew him, Thomas Jeremy Speedle." Surprise registered in the blue eyes of the New Yorker as he took the photos warily. After a moment he started looking through them, handing them off to Mac as he went. Speed nodded and turned back to the time line.

"Tom and I were _mirror twins_ , identical twins who appear to be physically opposite. Most _mirror twins_ have different handedness, get opposite physical maladies, and even have been known to have nearly identical fingerprints, unlike regular identical twins. When we were ten I got tonsillitis and Tom got appendicitis; he needed surgery, but I was fine and managed to keep my tonsils. I'm right-handed; he was a lefty." Placing a finger on his thirteenth year, Speed bent closer. "Contrary to popular belief, not all twins get along like long lost lovers. In fact Tom and I hated each other."

When Alexx put her hand on his shoulder, Speed glanced back and offered her a small smile adding, "Well, actually, he hated me. I barely tolerated him. I was willing to try, but I did get sick of him trying to use my identity to get whatever he wanted." The investigator glanced over at his supervisor, who watched him in avid interest. "My parents caught on pretty quickly to Tom's attempts of identity theft and he rarely got away with it. Parents and other close relatives are actually pretty good at telling their twins apart if they try."

Speed turned, slipping over so the others could see his life's story spread before them. "Tom hated Matthew, my baby brother, even more than he hated me. When I stopped him from mutilating the kid, Tom ran away and started working the streets in the City." Turning his head, he clarified for Alexx, "New York City. He ran drugs, weapons, and anything else he could do to get by. I'd go down in the summer, when I was off school, and try to get him to come back home. My parents wanted to try to get him into some sort of counseling. It never happened. By the time I was sixteen, Tom had changed his name to TJ Spedelli and was running with some gang. When I was seventeen, an officer in the gang unit told me Tom had died of an over dose." With a shrug Speed looked directly at Alexx, knowing this story probably should have been told to her a long time ago; she was his best friend after all. "I believed the guy and went home to my parents. We agreed never to speak about him again. they wanted to clear the family name and just forget how they failed."

xxx

Alexx wrapped her arms around Speed and hugged him close. She had seen the pain, the loss, the sense of failure in Tim's eyes and knew that, despite his nonchalance, he truly had been affected by the loss of his twin. It was a tragedy that the loss had been by the age of thirteen, not the supposed death at seventeen, and in such a horrible fashion as the fight over their baby brother.

Pulling back slightly, she stroked a hand down his unshaven cheek, smiling gently at him. When he gave her a small smile in return, she nodded and looked over at Aiden, who was perusing the autopsy photos. Deciding that Speed needed to hear about his brother's real death, or at least as much as she could give him, Alexx turned back to her friend and placed a hand on his arm. He looked directly at her, brown eyes meeting brown.

"You and Horatio went to that jewelry store, where you were shot when your gun misfired." At his nod of remembrance, she said, "I was called in but didn't even get to pronounce you before I was sent back to the morgue by my supervisor. He said _he_ needed to process you because you were law enforcement." Alexx rolled her eyes. "Two hours later, a body was brought to me with a tag reading _'TJ Speedle.'_ He'd been shot almost in the heart and had died within the previous three hours. I thought it was you and performed the autopsy."

Speed smiled at her and Alexx stroked his cheek again. She couldn't reassure herself enough that her Timmy was still alive, was standing right next to her after a year of mourning. Smiling wider, Alexx turned her head to address the rest of the team he'd brought with him. "The driver was a new one, and he'd had a pick up from the other side of Miami. I can only think the other victim was a shooting with the name of _'TJ Speedle,'_ as well. When he got to my morgue, he must have mixed up the bodies and given me Tom Speedle accidentally." Looking up at Speed, her smile widened even more. "Somehow, Tim managed to survive and wound up in the hospital under his brother's name."

"Well, that mix up may have saved my life, but I think it endangered me, Alexx."

She frowned, confused, as Speed looked Mac in the eyes. "After only two months, I was taken out of the hospital and abandoned in an unheated apartment in Maine. I was given a sleeping bag and a bit of money for food which ran out pretty quick. I was literally dying on the floor of some apartment when a second agent found me and took me back to the hospital." His voice turned thoughtful as he said, "Her name was Agent Gideon . . . Ivana."

Speed didn't notice Mac's jolt of recognition at the agent's name. With a frown, Speed pulled away from Alexx and moved away from the evidence corner. He slid his hands into the pockets of the lab coat he wore over his CSI jumpsuit. "I was released two weeks later, though I really should have stayed, but there was no money for the bills and I needed to make the job interview at the lab. That's when I showed up." He looked at Mac, who nodded once in acknowledgment.

"I'm not as familiar with the Witness Protection Program as I thought, Baby, if that's the treatment they're allowed to give their witnesses." Alexx hated the idea that her Timmy had been abandoned to die in some cold nowhere then forced to work before he'd had a chance to heal. It didn't sit right at all.

Looking at her, Speed shrugged. "I'm not sure why Tom would have been in the program, what he knew, but I think someone in the program was trying to kill him. That's why I was neglected that way."

"Do you think Agent Gideon was in on it?" Mac's voice sounded neutral, not giving away whether he believed the charge of attempted murder or not, though his blue eyes narrowed intently.

"No," Tim shook his head. "She paid for my medical care after she rescued me and I know she's never been reimbursed. I've tried giving her money from my checks, but she refused." Alexx smiled at the frustration Tim displayed at being unable to pay the Federal Agent back for his life. He continued, "I think someone else in the program may want whatever information Tom had out of circulation. Because I'm still alive, that person probably thinks Tom's still alive."

"Does that mean you're in danger?"

All eyes turned to the young boy in surprise. It seemed that everyone had forgotten a child was listening. Alexx sighed and sank to one knee, placing one hand on HR's torso and one on his back.

"It's possible, HR, but we're going to do everything we can to protect Tim. You know your father wouldn't let anything happen to him. He's one of your father's friends." She offered HR a smile then glanced up into the wary look on Tim's face. With a small smile, she told him, "This is HR Caine . . . Horatio's son."

"I didn't know H had a kid," Speed responded, surprise registering in his dark eyes. "I've got a lot of catching up to do."

Alexx nodded sagely. "That you do, Baby. That you do."

xxx

Mac watched as Tim Speedle and Alexx Woods led the boy from the room, talking softly to each other. He'd catch up with his tech later; the man had things he needed to talk about. For the moment the ex-Marine was more content to look over the evidence collected on Speed's entire life.

As he read, aware that Danny was reading by his side, it became readily apparent that either this was an elaborate web of lies or Tim Speedle was nothing like TJ Spedelli. Danny started to noticeably relax next to Mac, and the supervisor was relieved, pleased that his instincts had once again proven right; the man he'd known as Joe Avery was a good man and a good cop.

He wondered if Tim would choose to go back to New York or stay if the chance were offered. Mac's idle musings were interrupted by the sound of crashing and indistinguishable yelling coming from somewhere nearby.

The New York team hurried out to see what had happened in the crime lab.

xxx

HR, seeing his father coming down the steps from his office, broke away from Alexx happily. He ran to the man, barely aware that Alexx and Tim merely continued on their way to the morgue to catch up. The boy was too excited at seeing his father's lab, with his father, to care much what the doctor was doing.

"Dad! Aunt Yelina!" He grinned at the surprise on their faces. His dad's normal gentle look came over him and HR smiled wider. Somehow that look always made everything seem okay.

"Hey! RJ!" He spotted his cousin and waved to the teen, not stopping his progress towards his father. One thing did stop his mad dash, however: coming quite quickly behind his dad was none other than Mom, and she looked really angry.

The young redhead stopped running and stood, uncertainly, watching the three approaching adults. Dread swept down on him. Mom had come to get him again, and now he'd have to leave.

Leaving had been a big part of HR's young life. It seemed like every few months his mother would pick him up at one person's house, hang out with him a couple of days, then drop him off with somebody else. She said she had to go away a lot because she was a reporter and she had to talk to a bunch of important people. HR wondered if he'd ever get to be one of those people his mother considered important enough to talk to.

For the last nine months he'd been living with Dad and it had been great. He'd never met the man before then, and his Mom had never even told him that the guy was still alive, but that was okay. HR had finally gotten to meet Horatio Caine, and his father really seemed to care about him. And the best part was that his dad was a criminalist; okay, not quite a cop but maybe even more important. After living with his dad for only one week, HR had decided that he was going to be a criminalist, too, when he grew up. Then he could work at his dad's lab and they wouldn't have to be apart. They could spend the entire day together.

But now when he was finally happy and with someone who really seemed to like him, his mom had to come back and mess things up.

HR wanted to find a place to hide that was so good, his mother would give up looking for him and leave him alone. Maybe if he begged, promised he'd be extra good, she'd leave him with Dad again while she went on her next assignment. Then if he could keep getting her to leave him with Dad, maybe someday she'd forget to come pick him up and he could stay forever.

"Junior, there you are!" HR cringed at what he considered a babyish nickname.

xxx

Horatio got to his son before Peg did and he offered the worried looking child a gentle smile, fighting his anger at the woman who'd been yelling at him a moment before. His son smiled back. His ex-wife caught up to them a moment later and the hesitant, hopeful smile died on the child's lips.

"Good, you're here. I'm back." Peg smiled down at the boy, apparently unaware of his unhappiness as he slumped in the over-sized jumpsuit. "We're going to California, won't that be great?"

"Do I have to?" HR had never whined at something Horatio had told him to do so the reaction rather took the man by surprise. It seemed to be something standard for Peg though as she merely glared in exasperation at the child.

Pushing her drenched black hair out of her eyes, the woman snapped, "Of course you have to, Junior. If I go, you go."

"You don't have to go, HR."

Peg turned her glare on Horatio, but the redheaded man stood firm, staring her calmly in the eyes. Her voice was a near growl. "Don't go filling his head with lies, 'Ratio. He's going with me to California."

Quite aware of the attention they'd garnered from not only Yelina and Ray Jr., but from the Miami investigative team and even a handful of vaguely familiar people in crime lab jumpsuits, Horatio merely tilted his head and stated firmly, "I've already told you, Peg. He's staying with me. You knew that before Christmas when you asked me to take him." Watching her mouth work to form words, he added, "I told you that I'd take him, but you wouldn't get him back. You left him anyway."

With a hissing noise, Peg whirled on him and stormed forward, finger jabbing at the air as if to punctuate her angry words. "I am his mother, 'Ratio. He is my son. You didn't even know he existed until last Christmas. You can't keep him. He's mine."

Horatio's voice hardened at her display of self-centered greed. "He's not some object you can put on a shelf whenever you get bored, Peg. He's not a toy or a possession. He's a human being with rights and feelings."

"No court would dare give him to you." Peg continued as if he hadn't spoken. "I'm his mother. I have a great job. You work in a dangerous profession where people get killed all of the time. No judge will award him to you."

Aware of just how much pain their argument most likely caused their son, Horatio simply nodded. He gentled his voice, placing a careful hand on his son's shoulder. "Okay, Peg. Okay. Since we can't agree we'll make a deal, shall we? We'll let HR decide where he wants to live."

Peg's quick mind worked through the possibilities of the bargain. Finally, the woman nodded and smiled overly-sweetly at the boy. "Junior, who do you want to live with? Daddy, who'd never even bothered to visit you before and who will most likely get shot by some punk and leave you in an orphanage like _Oliver Twist_? Or Mommy, who will take you all around the world to really neat places like France and England, and maybe even China? You'll be living with a famous reporter meeting all kinds of famous people."

The arguments she presented were obviously heavily biased in her favor, and Horatio took a deep breath just to keep calm. He decided to add his own justifier in before the boy made his decision. Slipping to his knee, looking the boy square in the eyes, Horatio said, "HR, here you'll be in the same school system every year. You'll live in a stable home in one place and get regular meals. You'll always know the babysitter you'll stay with, if we need one. And," his eyes never wavered from his son's, "you'll be with me. I love you very much."

"Mommy loves you, too, Junior." Peg threw in desperately, her voice showing her anger at what she apparently deemed as Horatio's unfair interference.

HR looked over at Peg, the woman he'd known his entire life, then back at the man whom he'd only met nine months before. His intense blue stare seemed to penetrate his father and Horatio found it was all he could do to not hold his breath in nervous anticipation; he forced his self to breath normally. The boy's eyes slowly moved to his mother and he studied her just as seriously. Then he pulled out of Horatio's grasp and turned to walk to his mother.

Horatio wanted to cry.

"Mom," the boy's voice was steady, calm, and his father knew that the decision had been made, there was no changing it. Peg smiled triumphantly at her ex-husband. "Mom, I . . . I hope you have a nice time in California and England and . . . and . . . China. I want to live here with Dad."

"What!" Peg's voice was a shocked squeak. Her grey eyes turned down towards her son and she seemed uncomprehending for several seconds. Then she snarled at Horatio, pointing at him in accusation. "You did this. You turned him against me!"

With a slight shake of his head, Horatio walked quickly up behind his son and put his hands on the boy's shoulders, feeling them straighten in his grasp. "I did no such thing, Peg. You taught him everything."

The mother glared down at her child and demanded, "Do you know how hard I worked, Junior? I went to school and worked evenings and weekends. I struggled and sacrificed. I slaved, and now I'm finally going places. You're making a stupid mistake. Do you know just how many people read my column? My name is famous worldwide, Junior! That kind of fame will open doors!"

HR slipped backwards into the protective embrace of his father, his decision unwavering.

Horatio smiled sadly at his former wife and lover, knowing she would never understand the choice the boy had made; she was too self-absorbed to see how anyone could want to be anywhere but with her. Horatio nodded his head, his hands lightly squeezing his son's shoulders in reassurance.

"That's right, Margaret. You have your name . . . and I have my son."


	21. Lightning Strikes Twice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon
> 
> .

During the argument in the main lobby almost all of the bystanders quietly left the general area. No one should have been privy to the scene, and it had been uncomfortable to witness. By the time the argument finished, and Peg reeled with the understanding that she had lost the fight for her son, only Calleigh and Stella remained.

As if by some unspoken agreement, Danny and Aiden had moved back into the layout room, followed closely by the tall, dark-haired, hazel-eyed Ryan Wolfe. The Miami investigator wasn't sure who those two were and wasn't about to leave them unattended in the lab. A frowning Eric turned to go to the locker rooms to get some dry clothes for Horatio's ex-wife; he was willing to still help the woman despite her viciousness. Mac moved towards the lower area and the morgue, deciding that talking to Speed would be the most direct way to solve many of the questions that were still floating around. Wanting to avoid the horrible scene she knew had been coming, Yelina had taken her son, Ray Jr., to the snack machines close at hand; she would be able to tell when the fight ended as well as the results, but Ray Jr. wouldn't actually be watching the argument.

xxx

At the sudden silence in the lobby, Yelina moved towards the door to check on her brother-in-law and nephew. Something about the tableau before her let her know that, at least for now, Peg had accepted defeat and conceded the child to his father. Relief swept over the detective and she smiled.

Horatio kept his hands on his son's shoulders, watching his ex-wife carefully. Peg had given in but he knew better than to think she'd be cowed for long. He could see a long, drawn out court battle for custody in the future. The redhead had every intention of winning the case, too; he loved his son too much to let him go back to such a lonely life as Peg's little pet possession.

The younger redhead contentedly leaned into his father, watching his mother warily. He knew that somehow his father would make it all right; he'd get to stay forever. To the child of ten there was suddenly nothing his father couldn't do.

xxx

John Fredericks frowned as he noted the six vehicles, four of them law enforcement marked Hummers, parked in front of the Miami-Dade Crime Lab. He hadn't counted on it being so crowded; that would make his interview a little more difficult. With a quick glance he noticed a driveway to the side of the building and started maneuvering down its flooded surface. In passing a second parking area, he noted four vehicles, none marked, and wondered just how many people had been allowed to stay; wasn't the place under mandatory evacuation? The FBI agent wanted to park where he would be noticed least, and it seemed he would continue to be thwarted with every attempt. The back parking area was loaded with three Hummers and a law enforcement marked truck; one Hummer even had a child's bicycle strapped on the roof rack. _Just what's going on here, anyway, a hurricane party?_

Pulling into the parking spot furthest from the truck, the agent put his rental car into neutral and sat thinking, letting the engine idle.

He had wanted privacy to interview his witness but all of these vehicles denoted that privacy was a hard to come by commodity in this lab. All of those people connected with the mass of vehicles could be a good sign. It meant he actually had a chance of finding his witness and interrogating him; fewer people meant worse odds that his witness was indeed there to begin with. Fredericks had already taken a big chance guessing a lab technician would be sent to the lab and not an area of heavier danger or damage. Maybe his gamble would pay off. And if the witness wasn't here, he'd check in with the police task force, or even FEMA, to verify the New York team's location. For now Fredericks preferred to keep a low profile.

Calmly, the agent lifted his eyes to stare at the double doors leading into the building. His breathing was steady, his demeanor calm. Slowly, the agent with the slicked back salt-and-pepper hair reached down to reassuringly touch the hilt of his service weapon. He eased it out, pulled out the magazine, and checked to make sure it was fully loaded. With a nod, the man slid it back in place, listening for the reassuring click. Fredericks then slipped out of his car and into the blowing rain, heading for the morgue doors and his intended target.

xxx

"Look at you, Timmy, you've lost weight." Alex smiled at the younger man and touched his cheek yet again. She'd been continually reaching out to him, reassuring herself that he was indeed standing in front of her, for the last half hour. It would take some getting used to; Alexx had been in mourning for her friend for a year.

With a small smile, Speed let Alexx touch him as often as she wanted; he'd missed the contact. The New York team was friendly but more reserved, less personable, than the easy-going Miami crew. It was good to be home at last. "I've been eating," he said on a small laugh.

It was somewhat disconcerting for Alexx when Tim walked past the slab she used for autopsies; a year ago, exactly, she'd done his autopsy there. She reminded herself that it was his brother she'd done the autopsy on, not him. For peace of mind, however, the doctor grasped the investigator's hand and tugged him towards the counter instead.

The friends had been talking for an entire half hour, knowing that the real world would need to be met soon, knowing that the rest of the Miami team had a right to know Speed was still alive. They wanted some personal time, however, and were putting the confrontation off a little bit: just another half hour or so and the entire lab could be told about what was going on, that Speed's twin was the one lying in a grave, that the prodigal son had returned.

Knowing there were two teams of investigators in the building, neither paid attention to the sound of a lone set of footsteps approaching. They continued to talk, trying to catch up on a year of missed days and lost chances. Somehow, through their words, they attempted to seal that inadvertent rift that had started with a bullet through the heart.

There were a few sounds one never forgot in one's life. The sound of a gun's hammer being cocked for firing was one of them. As soon as the click rang out, instinct took over and the pair dropped down to the floor of the morgue, Speed covering Alexx with his larger body. Neither saw the threat but they could sense it.

Tim raised his head carefully, one hand over Alexx's head as she trembled beneath him. He scanned the area, trying to locate the gun they'd heard. He could see a shadow, but he couldn't identify who it belonged to. The investigator lowered his head and whispered in the doctor's ear, "Stay here, Alexx. I'll check it out." 

Pain ripped through his side, causing an involuntary gasp as blood spattered the pair.

"Timmy!" The shot seemed to echo around them. Twisting her body under the heavy weight of her friend, Alexx was all too aware of the warm blood seeping from his wound. Not again! She wasn't about to lose her baby again. Her steady healer's hands found the injury to his side and covered it, trying to stem the flow of life-giving blood.

"Damn," Speed gasped, his hand covering Alexx's over his wound. "I hate getting shot!" He turned his head in the direction the shadow had been and saw a man, weapon held comfortably in his hand . . . and that gun was pointed directly at the pair on the floor.

xxx

No matter where they were in the vast laboratory building, there was no mistaking the sound of a gunshot. There were no running machines and busy staff to provide cover noise. From the layout room to the locker rooms to the myriad hallways in between, it was evident someone in the building had fired a weapon. Everyone reacted to the noise.

Horatio quickly shoved his son towards his sister-in-law, drawing his own weapon as he led Calleigh and Stella towards the stairwell, followed within moments by Ryan, Danny, and Aiden. From the locker room, closer to the morgue, ran Delko, also with weapon drawn; he could tell the gunshot had come from the morgue and he was worried for Alexx.

Peg screamed in fear. She'd just gotten home from a war and should have been used to the sound of gunfire, but somehow it was different when one expected to hear it as compared to the unexpected sound in a safe area.

A single stinging slap across the cheek cut the woman off and drew her shocked attention to the other woman standing close by. Angry, Peg turned on Yelina. "You didn't have to hit me!" 

Rolling her eyes, nodding quickly as HR stepped next to her, the detective reached out and gripped Peg's uninjured arm. "Ray, HR, come with me." She snagged a first aid kit in passing and led the complaining woman back up into the office they'd so recently vacated. Yelina ignored the sight of Madison's destroyed picture frame, instead pushing Peg into a chair and helping to pull off her suit jacket. If it kept the woman out of the way, and gave her a chance to keep the boys safe as well, Yelina would tend her former sister-in-law's injury.

The sound of the front door opening drew Yelina from Horatio's office with a frown. She handed her teenaged son the first aid kit and quickly headed down the steps towards the blonde woman who'd just entered the lobby.

"May I help you?" The blonde was soaked and panting as if she'd just run through the hurricane. She looked up at Yelina and immediately flashed FBI credentials, heading directly towards her. Yelina came to a stop at the bottom of the steps, wary but listening.

"Ivana Gideon. There's a man down here whose life is in danger. He's being hunted." The agent had been driving since her plane had landed, breaking half of the traffic laws for the state of Florida. "His name is Speedle . . ." 

"Speedle?" Yelina pulled out her phone with a frown, not sure why the woman would think a man dead a year would be in danger now. Yelina knew about Stetler's investigation, however, so determined that Horatio should deal with this newest problem. Besides, with the sound of gunfire in the lab the FBI agent may have been on to something.

xxx

Mac, retracing his earlier steps back to the morgue, slowed and drew his weapon, keeping his eyes alert for the shooter; the echo joined the memory of a child's innocent question _'does that mean you're in danger?'_. He would to bet that someone knew Tim Speedle had returned to Miami and that person wanted Speed dead. The question was: had he gotten his desire with that single shot?

Rounding the corner, Mac saw a man standing in the doorway to the morgue, facing inside. He held a weapon in his hand, and the steady grip told Mac that the man was specifically aiming at someone. The New York detective had no idea how many hostages the man had.

Falling back on procedure, Mac called out, "Police, drop the weapon!" 

His distraction worked to a point; it briefly drew the man's attention from those in the morgue. Mac kept his weapon steady on the suspect as he continued his slow approach. "Drop the weapon now." He took another couple of careful steps towards the man.

Mac had trained for years in rapid response, first in the Marines then in law enforcement; he prepared for the man to fire the gun. He even prepared to have the man turn the weapon on him as a prime threat. What Mac hadn't been prepared for was the man firing his weapon at the same time he shifted his aim. Several shots rang out and Mac felt fire tearing through his thigh.

Drawing on discipline he'd never relinquished, the ex-Marine ignored the injury and returned fire. His shot missed as the man threw himself into the morgue for cover. Mac's adversary was apparently well trained himself and that raised the confrontation to a whole new level. The Marine-turned-detective ran the last few steps to the morgue's doorway and glanced cautiously inside, gun at the ready all the while.

Inside the room, he saw Speed lying atop his doctor friend, Alexx. Blood covered both, and it was uncertain just which one had been hit or how serious the injuries might be. The tall suspect with the gun was still turned towards Mac, weapon steady, bottle-green eyes cold.

"You're at a disadvantage, Taylor." 

_Who the hell is this guy and how does he know me?_ Mac frowned, his gun as steady as the other man's. "Drop your weapon." He gave the suspect one last chance to comply freely, already planning out the shot he'd need to take in order to disarm the other man.

Another loud shot, followed by searing pain in Mac's gun hand, quickly turned the tide against the New York detective. He instinctively fired back but lost control of his weapon with the recoil, dropping it with an involuntary curse. Mac noted that his adversary had received a shot in the arm and had dropped his own weapon, as well. As the ex-Marine crouched to reach for his backup; the suspect moved quicker, pulling his own and taking aim from his crouched position.

"Kick the gun over here, Taylor." 

If the weapon had been aimed at Mac, himself, he wouldn't have cooperated, but it was aimed directly at Alexx and Speed. Knowing he'd have to bide his time, hoping the others had heard the gunfire and were coming to help, Mac did as he was told. He used his injured leg to shunt his service weapon away from easy reach, out-maneuvering the man by making sure the gun skittered out of reach; it landed somewhere on the far side, near the morgue table but nowhere in reach of the two combatants.

"Cute," the suspect growled and scooped up his original weapon. He stood quickly, his aim never wavering from the bloody pair on the floor. With a flick of his head, hid hand steady, he instructed Mac, "Turn around, Taylor. Don't even try to stall, I don't care if I take all three of you down." For good measure, he added, "Conspiracy to run guns for drugs." 

Mac turned slowly, hands raised despite the blood seeping from his injured hand and thigh. His mind turned the words in his mind. He had seen or heard that phrase recently; if he could clear his pain-fogged mind, he'd figure it out. It seemed to be important somehow.


	22. Man Down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Tuesday, September 20, 2005: Miami: afternoon
> 
> .

Ryan could see Horatio, Calleigh, and another woman who might have been Detective Salas ahead of him entering the stairwell. Running with an unknown pair into the narrow passage, Ryan knew that too many people crowding through the same hallways would cause a problem. He reached out to tug on the arm of the brunette woman running step-for-step by his side. "Here," he called, shoving open the access door for the floor they were currently on. She nodded, called out, "Danny, this way," and followed the former patrolman out of the stairwell. He was vaguely aware of the blond man back-tracking up the stairs to join them.

Leading his unknown companions through the hall, Ryan let his good sense continue to prevail. He drew his weapon with one hand and his cell phone with the other, pressing for speed-dial and the number of the man he normally partnered.

Delko's voice sounded hushed as it came back, "Yeah, Wolfe?"

xxx

Cursing in Russian at the stupidity of not remembering to switch his phone to vibrate, the Cuban-American knew he had to answer; Ryan could need backup. The ringtone only told him who called, not why.

"Yeah, Wolfe?" Delko kept his voice low, stopping just before the corner that led to the morgue. He carefully peered around the curve as Ryan's voice came back.

"Three of us for the observation room; H is on the way to the morgue."

 _Good timing, Ryan._ "Yeah, I see him. He's got Calleigh and another." He didn't recognize the brown-haired woman in the Miami jumpsuit but that wasn't a problem. She didn't appear to be the threat, despite the gun in her hand. "I see one in the doorway, appears unarmed."

xxx

Horatio, with Calleigh and Stella, could also see the bleeding, unarmed Mac standing in the morgue doorway. He had his hands to either side, clenching the doorjamb with his left hand, blood fluidly running down his right hand and forearm. As it was the regular entrance, not the larger double doors for stretchers, Mac looked more like he was resting than straining to block the doorway.

"Mac, we heard gunfire." Stella's voice rang down the hall, drawing the tired, pain-filled gaze of the wounded man.

Casually, as if there were nothing wrong, Mac called out, "Weapons malfunction."

It was an extremely odd thing to say and instantly the hairs on the back of Horatio's neck felt like they stood up. He knew a second later that the New York detective must be a hostage, because the man added, "I've got it locked down, Stella; there's nothing the two of you can do."

 _He's talking in code._ Horatio quickly determined that there must be two or more people in the morgue; two other hostages by Mac's phrasing. From his angle, though, Horatio couldn't see the threat, or how many there were. He held his gun steady on the dark-haired investigator, letting Stella and Calleigh slip to better positions.

The red-haired leader of Miami's crime lab sensed something was wrong. He'd only worked with Mac once but knew the man to be on the ball, able to take care of himself. The combination of little sleep, a long drive, and the injuries he'd just received must have sapped into the ex-Marine's strength. The wounds had to be pretty serious.

xxx

Delko saw Calleigh and the unknown women slipping down the hall, positioning themselves to try to get a clear shot into the morgue. It wouldn't happen, though, as the man in the doorway effectively blocked any gunfire; he'd be hit unless he moved. Carefully, Eric whispered over the cell phone to Ryan, "You there yet?"

The voice came reassuringly back with: "Affirmative. Two down, one in doorway, one gunman."

Later he'd have to tease Ryan about his overly stiff delivery; the man sounded like he was in some SWAT movie. But for now, Eric was just glad to have the information they needed. He made a gesture across the hall so Horatio could see. Having caught the redhead's attention, moving carefully forward to get into a more advantageous position himself, Delko signaled to the door and held up two fingers then he signaled to his gun and held up one. He returned Horatio's nod of understanding and whispered into the phone, "Stay with me, Wolfe. Are they injured?"

xxx

Confusion gripped Stella followed closely by fear, which she ruthlessly tamped down. Mac's behavior was odd enough to alert her that something was seriously wrong, in addition to the blood running down his arm and soaking his jumpsuit trouser leg. The knowledge that someone had managed to take her best friend hostage seized her. Mind racing, the New Yorker tried to position herself better to see past her partner and into the room beyond.

It was no use; Mac was effectively blocking the door.

The smaller blonde woman had made it past Stella and had angled herself at the other side of the door, far enough away to be out of arm's reach but close enough to get a good shot in if the wounded detective moved. Horatio had hung back, angling on that side of the door. For her part, Stella was in front of Mac, backing a bit down the cross-hallway so she had maneuvering room, trying to judge Mac's situation as she moved.

Softly Horatio called out "Two inside, one gun," and Calleigh's response of "Gotcha" shot back just as quietly.

Suddenly Mac's behavior made sense. The gunman had been clever enough to place Mac in the doorway to block interference. The gun would have to be in contact with Mac, probably in a vital area, or the ex-Marine would have been fighting back despite injuries. Knowing that there were probably other hostages, however, reassured Stella that Mac was merely biding his time; a dead man couldn't help prisoners.

Holding her gun steady, Stella silently tried to communicate with her partner. She had a clear shot, the best of the group, to take down the man holding them there. If Mac could just duck, or even slip to the right a bit, she could take out the man she barely saw behind him. Frustration began to well; it looked like they were in for a very long stand-off.

xxx

"Bleeding badly, Delko," Ryan's voice confirmed that they had to move quickly. Eric looked up and signaled to Horatio that it was urgent, putting up two fingers to let him know the hostages were hurt. Thankfully, Horatio seemed to understand because he nodded once, his gun remaining steady on the man in the door.

xxx

"Hostages down," Horatio's voice was like a whip though it never raised above a harsh whisper.

Stella's eyes pleaded with Mac to move, to do something. But she knew he couldn't. Mac would have moved by then if he'd been able. The gunman had to have his weapon planted firmly against the detective's spine, anywhere else and Mac would have risked it.

"We're out of time," again the redhead's voice sounded harsh and Stella knew he was right.

Then Mac's blue eyes met hers, holding her gaze locked in a long moment of silent communion. A calm assurance came over her; she knew exactly what she had to do.

xxx

Fredericks, behind Mac, gun pressed firmly into his cervical spine, was only a few inches taller than the ex-Marine. That prevented him from being able to see just what was happening in the hallway. He could hear the few snatches of orders from a soft male voice, but it hadn't made the agent overly nervous. He didn't care if those in the hall knew about the hostages; he was definitely intent on killing the witness and holding this stand-off long enough would grant him that desire, albeit in a very slow, painful bleed-out. _So much the better after the trouble he's caused me._

xxx

Mac could tell the moment Stella understood; their bond from years of being partners had made communication easy, even without words. Slowly, Mac loosened his grip on the doorjamb, let his body become less resistant. Tightening would provide too much of a barrier, he needed his muscles as loose as possible if this would even have a chance of working.

Stella readjusted her grip on the gun, bringing it up to position. Despite the knowledge that it was the only way, her green eyes pleaded with him one last time. He firmed his resolve and nodded his head imperceptibly; _do it, now!_

Pain laced through Mac as Stella took the shot. He was whirled into the doorjamb, unable to catch his balance, and wound up slamming hard to the tiled floor. Blackness welled up sharply and he felt himself losing consciousness. The New York detective knew it was worth it, though, if it saved the pair on the morgue floor.

xxx

Keeping her gun pointed firmly at the suspect, Stella blocked the image of Mac's collapsing body from her mind. She couldn't afford to back down. Her shot may not have made it all the way through, and that meant she'd have to deal with an armed assailant. Time seemed to drag on forever as only a couple of seconds ticked by.

The man sank to the floor, blood coming from his chest and his head.

Lowering her hands, shaking now that the intense moment had passed, Stella looked towards the two hostages and was surprised to see Tim holding Mac's weapon, raised for firing. With a silent nod of thanks for the unexpected backup, Stella turned her eyes from the wounded man and hurried to Mac's side, reaching for his shoulder to try to stem the ready flow of blood from the through-and-through.

xxx

"What the hell just happened?" Rick Stetler's voice cut through the tableau, coming from right next to Delko, who still tried to clarify with Ryan about the second shot.

Turning to the armed IAB man, Eric shook his head, "That was two shots, Wolfe . . . did he get our man?"

"No," Ryan's voice called back as Rick pushed past the slower moving Delko and rushed to Calleigh's side; she moved forward into the morgue, her weapon still poised for action. "One of the hostages picked up a gun and shot the gunman. He's still armed, but bleeding heavily. Alexx is helping him."

Stetler came to a halt, momentarily blocking the doorway to the morgue. _Is that Speedle holding a weapon? It can't be. The man died a year ago!_ Rick barely acknowledged Horatio's firm push though he let his feet carry him out of the way so the redhead could get inside.

Quickly taking control of his own shock, the former CSI knelt by the still body of a man with salt-and-pepper hair, checking for a pulse. He found none but that wasn't too surprising. The suspect had been shot in the heart and the back of the head; either shot could have been fatal.

xxx

Inside the morgue, Calleigh did a slight double-take at the sight of Speed holding a gun. Alexx hurriedly tried to unzip the injured CSI's jumpsuit and lift it away from a profusely bleeding flank injury. Letting her eyes quickly sweep the room, Calleigh pointed her weapon straight at the man who looked like her friend. She couldn't take a chance that he was the unknown twin they'd found out about. "Lower your weapon."

He tossed it to the side as if relieved then collapsed backwards onto the ground. Alexx shook her head, fear lacing her words as she called, "Oh, no you don't, Baby. I'm not losing you again!" Her hands quickly checked over the entry wound in the man's side.

"All clear," Calleigh called out, stepping hesitantly closer to the bloody pair, ignoring Stella as the woman knelt by her own fallen comrade. With one more step, Calleigh lowered her weapon and called hesitantly, "Speed?"

Dark eyes moved to lock with blue ones, and he groaned out, "Not now, Calleigh, I'm trying to bleed on Alexx."

The Louisianan gasped, hand flying to her mouth, eyes widening. Then she slipped silently to the floor in a dead faint.

Behind her Horatio missed catching the falling woman, his reaction just a beat or two too slow.

xxx

Rick's head came up slowly and his eyes fell on the brunette woman close by; she was tending the wound of the man she'd shot. Holding the wallet he'd pulled from the dead man's inner pocket, the IAB man stood and turned on Horatio. "What the hell happened here, Caine?"

Tilting his head, Horatio turned towards Stetler, but not fully. He looked over the mayhem of the morgue: glancing over Calleigh, whom Delko had now reached; Stella tending Mac's shoulder; Alexx working on a Speed look-alike, he'd have to deal with that when he had a moment; to end on Rick standing by their deceased gunman. Calmly, as if stating the time of day to a curious child, the redhead replied, "That man was holding my people at gunpoint, Rick. He was a threat we had to neutralize."

"That man," Rick's voice rose in anger and he stepped over Calleigh's body, ignoring Delko's incensed "Hey!" Shaking the wallet at Horatio, he ground out, "That man was an FBI agent, Caine. Your person," and he gestured at the unknown woman, "just killed a Federal Agent!"

"A Federal Agent who was threatening my people and my lab, Rick," Horatio softly clarified. His concerned blue eyes met Speed's pain-filled brown ones, and he realized that the wounded man on the morgue floor was indeed the _real_ Tim Speedle. Horatio nodded in acknowledgement and Speed nodded back, hissing at whatever Alexx was doing,

"That bullet needs to come out, Timmy. I need to get you both to the hospital." The medical examiner included Mac in her assessment, glancing over at the other wounded detective.

Shaking his head, Rick said, "No one's going anywhere, Caine." He turned a quick glare on Alexx. "You're a doctor. Treat them here." He ignored the threatening frown settling on Horatio's face and pulled out his phone. "This is Detective Stetler. I need back up in the Crime Lab morgue . . . shots fired. I have an officer down, multiple suspects."

Horatio shook his head. "You're making a big mistake, Rick. That . . ."

"Save it, Caine." Rick looked towards the brunette woman than back to Speed as if suspecting one of them of harboring a weapon to ambush them with. "I've been letting you stall for almost a year. I'm not going to play your little games anymore." He swung around to face Alexx and her patient. "Timothy James Speedle, you are under arrest for gun smuggling, trafficking illegal drugs, and the murder of a Federal Agent."

Alexx's indignant intake of breath was overshadowed by Horatio's slightly louder, firmer, "You are making a mistake, Rick . . . I have proof . . ."

Rick stepped into Horatio's personal space but the redhead didn't back down. "I've got more proof than even five years of research will counter, Caine. You're going down as an accessory."

"Wait!" Heads snapped around at the new voice, the authoritative sound naturally commanding attention. Ivana, backed by Yelina, stood in the doorway of the slowly crowding morgue. Behind them Ryan and his two colleagues came to a halt, eyes roving over the occupants. Obviously that they all wanted to get to their own injured, but the Ivana's manner put a stem on any action other than Alexx's and Stella's life saving attempts. A gasp escaped Yelina as her eyes fell on the sight of a bleeding, but very much still alive, Tim Speedle.

"You sure know how to evacuate your lab, Caine." Rick's sarcasm broke the silence followed quickly by Ivana's "I'm a Federal Agent." Her declaration drew the IAB's attention, as well as the Crime Lab Supervisor's.

Holding up her credentials, Ivana carefully stepped into the room and groaned softly. A slight shudder seemed to run through the blonde agent as her eyes fell on the pale figure of the heavily bleeding Mac, but she drew her attention away from him and back to Speed. "How come I have to save your ass every time I see you, Joe?" She didn't approach Speed, however, instead walking directly up to the two antagonists in the center of the controlled chaos. "I'm here to arrest that man," she gestured to the body of Fredericks lying in a pool of blood and other body matter, "for attempted murder."

xxx

While the stand-off happened in the center of the floor, Delko slipped over to Alexx's side, having reassured himself that Calleigh was uninjured. He knew they'd found evidence that Speed was a twin, but it was still weird to see his best friend lying there alive after a year of thinking the guy was dead. Pushing back the odd sensations, Eric pulled a first aid kit from the counter above them and started helping Alexx.

"You've got to learn to duck, Speed." Eric's voice shook, but his hands were steady as he opened a scalpel in its steri-pak. Pulling the blood-soaked cloth away from his friend's body, Delko ran the extra-sharp tool down the fabric, feeling it easily pull apart under the blade. He reached into the kit and pulled out some gauze, but didn't use it yet. Instead, he pulled off his own damp shirt and tried to clean away the blood on Speed's flank, trying to see how much damage was there.

A light suddenly shone down, making it easy to see the bullet wound, and Eric glanced up briefly to give Calleigh a small smile of thanks. She looked in control, obviously pretending that she hadn't fainted a moment ago. Alexx made a murmur of approval at the added light.

xxx

On the other side of the morgue, Stella, still holding Mac's shoulder, noticed the pallor of his skin graying. "Mac!" She slapped his cheek to bring him around and felt relieved when his blue eyes finally opened, clouded with pain but not dull. "I need an ambulance here!" Her desperate call cut through the conversation behind her.

Life always taking precedence to protocol, Ryan dialed 9-1-1 and started talking to dispatch. He said, "This is Detective Wolfe at the Miami-Dade Crime Lab. We need two ambulances. We have officers down, suspect is under control."

Danny pushed past the taller Ryan, Aiden hot on his heels. Hanging up, Ryan slipped into the morgue and knelt next to Stella.

Aiden's voice sounded firm. "Let's cut away the jumpsuit, his leg's bleeding pretty heavily." Without pause, she pulled one of the sterile pair of scissors, normally used for autopsies, out of the closest instrument drawer. Danny grabbed some bandaging and antiseptic solution from the cabinets next to the door and both dropped to their knees next to their supervisor.

"I'm Ryan Wolfe."

As odd as the greeting seemed at the moment, it was good to know who they worked with. Glancing briefly at the CSI next to her, Aiden nodded and said, "Aiden Burn. This is Danny Messer," she nodded towards the blond. "Stella Bonasera and Mac Taylor," she finished, not indicating which was which, but Ryan apparently didn't need it clarified.

Danny didn't even nod at their temporary assistant; he probed Mac's gunshot hand, trying to determine what damage may have been done. Danny wasn't a medical expert but had been in Sheldon's morgue enough times to know a few things. Already the New York detective could tell the wound was a through-and-through, like Mac's shoulder. Using the back of his wrist, he pushed his glasses back into place and reached over for some solution to pour through the wound then started packing gauze inside.

Stella took the time to briefly nod at Wolfe, applying more pressure to Mac shoulder, one hand on the entrance wound and one on the exit. As Aiden reached around her, unzipping the jumpsuit to pull it away, Stella let up on the pressure only enough to allow the cloth to be stripped away, then her hands were pressing again, stemming the flow as best she could under the conditions.

"Welcome to Miami," came Ryan's soft voice, the irony not lost on the small group. The four detectives worked quickly to keep Mac from going into shock, trying to stabilize him, to stop the bleeding as much as they could while they waited for emergency crews to fight their way through the hurricane outside.


	23. Once and For All

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Setting: Thursday, September 22, 2005: Miami.
> 
> .

With a frown Mac quickly downed the water from the small medicine cup, washing the pain tablets down. He watched the nurse make a notation on her chart before she left on her rounds. Placing the cup on the edge of the bed table, the New York criminalist turned his attention back to the people gathered around his hospital bed. "So, this had nothing to do with the original shooting last year?"

"Not exactly," Ivana sat at the edge of her chair, back straight, as she looked from one patient to the other. It had been deemed easier if both Mac and Speed shared a hospital room, and the agent had to admit, it sure made this meeting possible. Her seat sat close to Speed's side, though she rarely took her eyes off Mac, though she hadn't said why the New York detective seemed to interest her.

From his position by the door, Rick Stetler frowned at the small group. On a chair between the two beds, Horatio sat in an apparently relaxed manner, smiling softly as he listened to Ivana. Speed simply lay in his bed, still trying to get the ink from his fingers; he'd been working at it since Stetler had insisted on fingerprinting him two days before. As for the two investigative teams: the New Yorkers performed the hurricane tasks they'd originally volunteered for, mostly cleaning and crowd control duties, and the Miami team was busily processed the lab, the morgue, and everything that went with this convoluted case. Delko had even put Speed's prints in the front just to get him cleared sooner.

Turning her attention back on the New York supervisor, the Federal Profiler opened her file, though she'd memorized its contents by then. "Fredericks had been in the gang unit in Staten Island fifteen years ago. Apparently, he'd been on the take for the Mafia, closely working with the _Tanglewood Boys_ gang. When Thomas Speedle ran away from home and got into the gang, he became a close contact with Fredericks. They ran guns and drugs back and forth for the local . . . bosses."

Speed finally looked up, "Fredericks was the cop who told me Tom died. His name was Johnson back then."

With a nod, Ivana confirmed the statement. "Apparently, Tom left the country on a large gun run and Fredericks took the opportunity to completely change his identity. He went from Fred Johnson to Jonathan Fredericks, acquired all new identification, and joined the Army. He even made Special Forces."

"Which would explain a few things," Mac added softly.

Horatio sat forward in his chair, twirling his sunglasses absently between his fingers.

Ivana finished, "Fredericks then managed to get a job with the FBI, while Tom continued his illegal activities and Tim joined law enforcement."

"So," Rick finally jumped in, still sounding displeased, but at least trying to stay in the case, "When Tim Speedle was shot, it was a mere coincidence that his brother was gunned down on the other side of Miami? And they just happened to be put into the same coroner's van, where the coroner's driver just _happened_ to mix them up?" His disbelief was very evident.

Ivana shook her head, wisps of blonde hair escaping her severe bun unchecked. "No. Fredericks caught wind of Tom coming back into the United States and he apparently thought his old gang buddy would turn him in. He actually ordered the hit on Tom. He also had connections with the hit-men hired by your false jeweler. When they saw Tim walk in, they already had a picture of Tom and orders to shoot-to-kill. The coincidence was that both twins were spotted by hired hit-men within a half-hour of each other. Fredericks had several people around the city waiting to kill Tom Speedle."

"And the coroner?" Rick was determined to find the loopholes in the theory Agent Gideon presented.

Horatio's voice was soft, amused, as he replied, "A rookie hired just two days prior. Since both men were marked with their last name and initials, per procedure," he turned his blue eyes to Stetler, "it was actually a very plausible mistake. We found him yesterday, and he actually remembered the ride since he thought it was _'creepy'_ that he was transporting twins." The redhead looked towards Speed and noticed the interest in his friend's brown eyes. "Since he was under the assumption that Alexx had already pronounced you at the scene, he thought the live body was that of _Tom_ Speedle, who was slated for Witness Protection by our friend Fredericks."

Speed took up the narrative, "So, he delivered me to the hospital and took Tom to the morgue, where Alexx thought she was getting me."

Apparently the meeting was going to Ivana's liking even if it wasn't going to Stetler's, for the blonde smiled and nodded, closing her file. "Fredericks tried to have Tim killed by first abandoning him then blocking the funds for medical care he was supposed to get. He put Tim specifically in the heart of the New York Crime Lab, hoping someone would recognize him and turn him over to the FBI, where he, Fredericks, would be able to go up and claim him personally. That didn't work out as he'd planned, though, because . . ."

"Because I didn't turn him in," Mac finished. "I went after the truth rather than a quick ID."

Eric Delko interrupted their meeting, walking into the room with a file. Normally he would have given his findings to Horatio, but at the redhead's casual nod, he headed directly to Rick Stetler. Offering the file, Eric hid his amusement at Stetler's look of surprise.

After carefully reading through the file, the IAB officer slowly closed it and handed it over to Horatio. Rick may have had it in for the leader of the crime lab, but he also admitted when he was wrong. Slowly, he turned towards Speed, straightening his shoulders, and said, quite pleasantly in fact, "You are not being charged with any crime, Speedle. The fingerprints match Tom Speedle to the last shipment of guns; yours haven't brought up any criminal record whatsoever."

"I could have told you that," Speed added, but he let it go, not needling the man too much. After all, IAB had just cleared him of his twin's crimes, something a long time coming. "I do have a question, though."

"What is that, _Tim_?" Horatio carefully, deliberately pronounced his friend's name.

Shifting a bit, wincing at the pain in his side, Speed looked at Ivana. "Calleigh found out about Tom through my brother, Matthew. Alexx was able to determine he wasn't me because Mom told her about the appendectomy. How did you figure out that I wasn't Tom and that it was Fredericks who was the one trying to kill me?"

Pushing the loose hair back from her eyes in minor annoyance, the pretty agent offered her one and only Protected Witness a smile. "I actually figured out Fredericks when I got an email at three in the morning; it just clicked after I figured out you were a twin."

Brown eyes met and held blue. "How'd you find out I was a twin? It's not in my records."

"Which is being remedied as we speak," Rick jumped in forcefully. "Even if he's dead, and disowned, your brother needs to be listed."

Again surprising Rick, Horatio joined his voice to the IAB man's in a gentle reproach. "If he had been listed, we might have avoided this whole problem, Speed."

Speed nodded, dismissing the problem since he actually agreed with the pair. "But how did you find out?" he pressed Ivana.

"I got an email right before I contacted New York to stop him. It was from your mother." Ivana shrugged, "I let her know you were in protective custody and asked if you had any tattoos. She told me that she had no idea if Tom, I still thought you were Tom at the time, had any tattoos. Then she wrote that she hated guns because she'd been told by an Officer Fred Johnson that Tom had died in a gang related shooting in New York fifteen years ago, and that her son Tim had just died a year ago, also from a shooting." Ivana smoothed her hair once more. "That's when I knew that I had Tim in custody, not Tom, and that Fred Johnson had mixed the Speedle twins up just like everyone else had."

With a sigh, Speed simply shook his head at the old problem. "So, it looks like Tom managed to steal my identity one last time for the ultimate identity theft."

"How's that," Horatio asked, nodding to the tired investigators from Miami and New York filing into the room; their shifts had ended for the day and they were visiting their two favorite patients.

Fondly Speed sent a smile to Alexx, letting her take his right hand in hers as she sat beside him. He looked over at Horatio. "Well, he got a full police funeral with gun salute and flag and all. He's buried in my grave."

With a laugh, Horatio nodded. "We'll have to remedy that, won't we?"

Mac looked directly across the suddenly crowded room, his eyes meeting Speed's. "Will you be coming back to New York? I could use another good CSI."

Surrounded by the people he loved, Speed joined in Horatio's laughter. The brown-eyed man shook his head with a soft smile, "Nah, I think I'll stay here. I've come home."

"That you have, Baby." Alexx leaned over and kissed his cheek, "that you have."

xxx

Fin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> – look for Story 11, "Life Altering" (stories 9 and 10 are JAG stories and have been shelved for the foreseeable future).


End file.
